All Those Who Wander
by StraitjacketChic
Summary: On a moonlit shore, a lady of Numenor stumbles upon a Teleri minstrel. In a city under threat, an elf lord meets a bastard in a red bandanna. In the midst of a civil war, a shipbuilder meets a sea serpent. On a quiet road, an enchantress meets a gray wanderer. "I do not know who you are, dear stranger, but I would follow you to the ends of the Earth."
1. The Beacon

**Author's note: **This is my first serious attempt to write an interpretation of Middle Earth. I've been in love with Tolkien's Arda for many, many years, which makes it all the more intimidating to try to write about it. Factual corrections and constructive criticism are always welcome, especially since the sheer amount of lore Tolkien created means I will almost certainly get things wrong.

A brief warning: the way I write elves and Men is not strictly lore-friendly. I want to represent a wide variety of people and behaviors. That includes different sexualities, moral systems, and interpretations of the changing times of Middle Earth, which I will try my best to fit into the context of the wonderful world-building that Tolkien has already done.

This was originally published on Archive of Our Own, and that is still the platform where I suspect I'll be most prompt and consistent with my updates.

* * *

**"Every love story is a ghost story."**

**-David Foster Wallace**

_ 2730 SA: The shores of Andustar, Númenor _

There was a maiden once, born in the lost land of Númenor, now long forgotten save in a few quiet corners of the World. But once she was a lady of the Western Shore of Andustar, and in the summers she danced day or night upon the golden sands of her fair home, adorned with silver beads that flashed and glittered against her shining black hair like stars in the firmament. Narthanes, lady of the beacon she was named in Sindarin, and the elves that landed upon those golden shores called her Silivressel, the glittering. And in her dark eyes burned the spark of the Second Born: a yearning for a life and love so great and so joyful that death would matter not at all, and that the passage of the ages would never extinguish the burning embers she left in her wake.

On a particular summer night-one that she would cherish and curse forever after in the same breath-she went to the shore to dance as she always did. But as she approached the restless, swirling sea, it appeared to her that the moon had lost its footing and fallen to the earth. For the sky was dark and impenetrable, but on the shore lay a silver figure, bright and still. No breath appeared to stir in his breast, and she sat beside him in the brine and traced his face with a finger, marveling at his tragic beauty. For though his hair was the color of moonlight, his face was young and serene, and he shone from within.

And though she did not know him, her tears for him mingled with the saltwater and washed over them. Then, by some unknown mercy, the sea was calmed, the sky cleared, and under the light of a thousand stars, his eyes opened. He looked up at her in wonder, for in her black hair he saw the lights of Varda enveloping him in a starry mantle. She spoke to him in Sindarin, with a voice low and sweet. With hands soft and delicate as birds, she raised him to his feet and covered him with her light shawl, and though she was small and slight, she bore his weight against her shoulder as she steered him gently to follow her to the house of her father, where she said he would be welcome.

Once the moonlit stranger, had eaten and dressed in the white cotton garb of Andustar, he began to speak freely, and he addressed the court of the castle of Andunie with a voice that was more song than speech. He was one of the Falmari of Alqualonde, and he told them that he had set out on a clear, bright night, the better to endure the travail of the Shadowy Seas. He had raised his voice in song to Uinen, begging safe passage from that fairest and most merciful of ladies. But her husband Osse had risen in anger as his swan-ship caressed the water, and he was flung far, far east-much farther from his beloved Alqualonde than he had ever dared to roam. His ship-his lovely ship, for which he wept as bitterly as for the fellow mariners who had drowned with it-had been dashed and sundered by the rocks.

Only by the grace of the Lady Uinen, had he been born by some secret, loving current, along to these distant shores. And here had he landed, naked and alone, far from the songs and lights of his people. Now he stood before her and her father, begging their hospitality until he could gain passage on an elven ship bound for the Blessed Realm.

In those days, Andunie remained the capital of the elf-friends, the Elendili, and now and again a ship from Tol Eressea would still grace their shores. But already a shadow had begun to creep towards Numenor. The great kingdoms of Men grew ever prouder and more avaricious, and many envied the deathless elves and coveted the Undying Lands for themselves. The Lord of Andunie, who was called Baralin by the visiting elves of Tol Eressea for his flashing dark eyes, gladly granted his hospitality to the shipwrecked singer. For he was a great friend to the elves and the leader of the Faithful who still followed the Valar. But as he looked upon the moonlit stranger his heart was troubled-for he perceived that between this supplicant and his daughter Narthanes there was much that was not yet spoken, but that must soon come to pass.

The moonlit stranger passed many months in Andustar, awaiting the sight of a proud white ship sailing from the West. But in that time he was not idle, and he came to be known as Glirron, the Singer, and he was much loved in the court of Baralin. And much he came to admire the boldness and beauty of Lord Baralin's daughter, who governed the city beside her widowed father, fair and wise as a great queen. Much talk there was in the city that she may someday marry the King of Numenor himself, and restore the line with her faith and her blood-for she was a descendant of Elros himself, and longevity and health was her birthright.

Glirron wrote many songs for Lady Narthanes, and at first he sang of her beauty, her charm, the grace of her dancing. But though these delighted the court and greatly flattered her father's vanity, she received them only with gracious courtesy, for she found herself wearied by such tributes. And though he liked to please his audience, it was for _ her _ smiles that he came to yearn. So he sang to her of oceans beyond her view, of distant starlit towers, and of deeds great and valiant in times long past. Then in his voice, she heard the melancholy echoes of the ocean, and she felt a pull on her heart like the sounding of a bright chorus of clarions off away in the distance.

Enthralled as she was by his songs, his voice, by his steady, earnest gray gaze, she knew that not long could she resist him while propinquity continued to test her. But soon, he would sail away upon a ship bound for lands forbidden to her, and she would return to the duties she owed to her own people. And so, if she could not deny him, she sought to evade him, and to wait for him to fade forever from her view. Privately she mourned the love that was never to be, and publically she changed but little. Only in the depths of her sloe eyes could a secret sadness sometimes be perceived, and then only for fleeting moments.

And so, life went on in Andustar, and the Maiden danced, and the Singer played, and the Lord sat upon his throne, and Disaster paced unmarked upon the golden sands.

* * *

_ 1600 SA: The Grey Havens, Lindon _

Upon the Gulf of Lune, in the great elven kingdom of Lindon, the beacon of the Grey Havens shone out upon the dark waters, bright and welcoming. On a night of particular clarity, when the firmament shone lovingly upon calm waters of the harbor, an elf lord, slender, dark-haired, and grave, looked out over the gulf with eyes gray and clear as a midsummer twilight. He gazed out upon the radiance of Varda's stars, and smiled at the western light of Earendil. But sad was his smile and troubled was his high, fair brow.

"Well, father, you rank sentimentalist," he said to the star in the west, "you told me of all the beauty and joy of love. Did you forget to tell me of its cruelty as well? For my beloved does not wait constantly for me, to greet me in rapture, as yours does for you. What becomes of the rest of us, who love in silence and doubt?" Elrond, squire of King Gil-Galad sighed deeply as the star seemed to twinkle and grow in luster for a moment, as if in response. "If only it were so easy. I could slay a thousand goblins before I dared ask her mother for her hand-well, you met her, you know what the Lady Galadriel is like. If only Elros were here. He would know how to disarm her. Or at least how to put courage into my heart to face her down."

So had Elrond passed many a night, sighing and fretting in a manner most unlike him. For he loved the Lady Celebrian, the maiden of the silver-bright hair and eyes like the sky on a clear winter's morning. But those eyes passed over him without regard, and the lady's mother watched him, Elrond Half-Elven, with suspicion and distaste.

On this night of particular clarity, Elrond's laments were cut short, for a ship of beauty never before seen in that part of the world came sailing out of the darkness. Standing upon the bow, brighter than the beacon, brighter even than the clear sky, a golden figure leaned forward into the wind, smiling out upon the harbor. And Elrond, shaken from his mournful soliloquy, leapt up and hurried to meet the newcomers.

He stood upon the harbor, holding rope to secure the bright vessel, but as if of its own accord, the ship bumped gently against the silver pier and stayed there securely moored, and three tall, proud figures descended. First, side by side, in robes that shimmered in all the shifting blues of the sea, two men tall and grave, with eyes like lightning. Solemnly they gazed upon the shining harbor, and they spoke between the two of them in murmurs.

After them descended the golden man, and all that beheld him found their hearts lifted as if by the rising of the sun. He leapt lightly over the railing of the ship and landed noiselessly upon the wood of the harbor.

Tall he was, and broad of shoulder, and his hair glowed with the golden hue of Laurelin. His countenance was noble and full of mirth and youthful beauty, and in his eyes shone the wisdom of the Eldar and the laughter of the breeze. Even lovelorn Elrond could not help but feel a lightening in his burdened heart, for in the manner of this stranger there was a measure of the familiar. In his carefree smile Elrond saw much of his long-passed brother Elros, and in his effortless strength he saw the courage of his father.

And indeed, when Glorfindel, for that was his name, saw Elrond, his beautiful golden eyes filled with happy tears, and he pressed his hands as though he had met his own kin upon that distant shore.

"Oh, son of Earendil," he cried, "how I welcome the sight of you, my friend. I bear messages of great love from your mother and father. They miss you dearly, and wish you joy in your life here."

From that night, Elrond and Glorfindel passed their days almost always in each other's company. And Elrond saw in the heart of his beloved friend the courage of the lion and the kindness of a warm summer afternoon. But slowly he came to see too the restlessness of the eagles, and a yearning that could not be named, nor allayed by any of the grandeur and hospitality of the court of Lindon.

And, presently, he perceived that the beauty of his newfound brother had brought joy to more hearts than just his. For they lived in a time of fear and dread and looming shadows-the arrival of the hero of Gondolin, slayer of dark and evil things, defender of the weak, shed light over the realm that drove back the shadows for a time and that kindled fires in the hearts of many of the maidens of the court of Gil-Galad.

So it was with a bittersweet joy that Elrond watched as the ice over the heart of Celebrian was melted by the warm sunlight of Glorfindel's presence. He appreciated in agony the loveliness of the glowing smiles she bestowed upon the golden lord, and when they danced together, he reveled in the excruciating beauty of their gold and silver orbit.

And so hope returned to Middle-Earth, and with it walked heartbreak.

* * *

_ 2803 SA: Andúnië, Númenor _

Until his sixteenth summer, Gimilzagar, son of Zôrzagar, had never seen a dead body. Death seemed to retreat instinctively from the golden glow of the sands and trees of Andustar. On that enchanted shore, the children of the Faithful laughed and tumbled carelessly in fields of fragrant flowers, and covered their skin in the crystalline salt of the pure waters of the sea. So when Gimilzagar pulled his prettiest friend into his favorite grove of sweet-scented Yavannamírë trees, hoping to finally find a moment of solitude to sing her his courtship song, he took many long moments to understand the strange smell and the dark shapes that hung, swaying slightly from those lovely branches. Only when his companion uttered a soft cry of horror and ran forward did he register that something may be amiss in his enchanted clearing. By the time his eyes had adjusted to the filtered green light and his mind had painstakingly identified the hanging objects, his companion had scaled a tree and pulled a small dagger from her belt as she walked along one burdened tree branch like a cat.

"Gil," she whispered sharply, "come on, we need to cut them down. Help me."

Gimilzagar gazed up at her, paralyzed with horror.

"Azruarî," he said hoarsely, "these are… they're…"

But Azruarî was occupied on her tree branch, hacking at the rope that suspended one of the lifeless bodies in midair. So occupied was she, in fact, that even her unusual ears did not detect the rustling on the outskirts of the grove. Only when an arrow came whistling out of the trees, burying itself near Gimilzagar's heart, did she look away from her macabre work. This time, it was she who watched motionless, unable to comprehend, as Gimilzagar-sweet, naive, misguidedly romantic Gimilzagar-crumpled to the ground with a cry. She swallowed her scream, willing her muscles to move. After what felt like an age, though it could only have been seconds, she crept silently back along her branch, retreating into the leaves of the fragrant hanging tree, and the shadows reached out to shelter her. She watched, suspended in the horror of the moment, as three men, one holding a crossbow, ran into the clearing and knelt over her dying friend.

"Just a boy-no elvish blood," the largest of them announced to his companions. "Take his satchel and purse and leave him-we must hurry back before someone discovers us."

"There was another," murmured the bowman in a soft voice that made Azruarî's blood run cold. "I saw two enter the clearing. One vanished easily into a tree-too easily. There's an elf here." He raised his eyes to the trees, and the hidden girl shuddered as his gaze swept over the branch that hid her. They were of the palest blue, full of coldly seething hatred. Then he dropped his eyes to the dying boy at his feet.

"Look. The boy carries a lyre. I think he was more than a _ friend _of these pestilent elves. I think he brought an elf maiden here for courting, didn't he?" The odious bowman bent over the injured boy and scrutinized him. But Gimilzagar stared into the man's dead eyes with an impassive gray gaze and said nothing. "Come, boy, tell us where the elf maid is and I'll spare your miserable life."

"There was no one here," the boy declared in a strong, ringing voice. "I came here only to sing to the shadows and the sea wind." The bowman aimed a kick at Gimilzagar's ribcage.

_"Liar," _he spat. "Elf-loving scum."

"_ And proud of it, _" said the boy in clumsy Sindarin. With a snarl, the bowman drew a thin dagger and plunged it into Gimilzagar's throat, twisting it cruelly. The boy gurgled, twitched, and lay still.

"He deserves much worse than mere death. Let us make an example of him. Quarter him, take his manhood, pin him to the gates of his cursed city."

At these words, the girl in the tree felt the ice that kept her still shatter, as rage tore through her body. Her vision blurred red and she coiled, preparing to leap down upon the murdering King's Men and sever their throats with her dagger. But the split second before she struck, she heard, so close it might have come from the tree itself, a woman's voice of almost unbearable beauty, musical and powerful as the sea winds, command her.

_ Wait. _

Something seemed to brush along the nape of her neck, like cold fingers tracing her spine. She found herself immobilized by the authority in the voice, only able to wait and wonder, expecting the men to turn and fire upon the source of the noise. But no one seemed to have heard the voice of power, and she was alone in the branches.

Then several things happened simultaneously. The cruel bowman raised his dagger to begin mutilating Gimilzagar's lifeless corpse, and Azruarî let out an involuntary gasp. As the men turned to find the source of the sound, a whistling sound announced four knives, thrown from the shadows. One buried itself in the forehead of the large man, dropping him instantly. Another sliced through the bowman's right hand, drawing a hideous shriek from his lips. The last two severed the ropes holding each of the corpses, casting them down upon the King's Men.

_ Now. _

Without looking around to find the source of the commanding voice, Azruarî launched herself from her branch upon the back of the bowman's other companion and cut his throat from ear to ear before he could scream. She looked up from her kill to see a familiar female form emerge from the tree cover. The small woman drew a long dagger from her belt and attacked the bowman as he whirled on Azruarî. The silver adornments in her dark hair glittered in the dappled light as she slashed at her enemy, disarming him quickly and driving him back against a tree. She pinned him there with her dagger to his throat.

"Rope, Azruarî, bring me rope," she barked. Azruarî hastened to cut rope from the neck of one of the hanged and brought it to her mother. "Bind him."

Azruarî hesitated. She wanted to kill him right then and there, to soak her hands in his blood. She had never felt bloodlust before that day, but now she was overwhelmed by the desire-nay, the _ craving _-for violent revenge. But her mother caught her with a stare that shook her back to her senses enough that she could restrain her hatred and hurry forward to help. Her sailor's hands made quick, powerful knots around the man's hands and legs, hogtying him in the most painful way she could manage. The four Andúnië guards who had accompanied Azruarî's mother to the clearing chuckled at her work.

"Your daughter has developed quite a sense of justice, Gimlîth," observed Aglarân approvingly.

Gimlîth raised a brow as she surveyed her child's work.

"Yes," she agreed, smiling sardonically, "I'm exceedingly proud of her." She began swiftly checking her daughter for injuries like a mother panther rolling her cub over for grooming.

"I'm alright, mother," Azruarî said automatically, though she was not at all sure that was true. Her mother seemed to share her doubts.

"If you are truly "alright" after this, I will be terribly concerned. What in the name of the Valier just happened?"

Calmed enough by her mother's gruff presence, she told them everything. Or at least, almost everything. She told them of the walk with Gimilzagar, of coming upon the hanging bodies, of scaling the tree to cut them down from their ignominious display, and of Gimilzagar's death… here, she choked slightly and could not continue. Nor did she entirely wish to explain the mysterious, commanding voice that had saved her. Aglarân placed a large hand upon her shoulder and squeezed gently.

"These are elf bodies." Gimlîth's voice was clear and carefully neutral as she said it, but Azruarî could see a deep fear stirring in her mother's dark eyes. "Two of the Tol Eressëa envoy, Sildaner and Yualo."

Aglarân cursed and shook his head.

"I have heard of incidents like these happening to the East… but I did not believe the King's Men bold enough to come to Andustar. In their craven way, Gimlîth, they are growing braver. We cannot hold them off forever." The guard cast a significant glance at Azruarî, his eyes falling upon the points of her ears.

"I know," Gimlîth murmured. "I know." She raised her eyes from the corpses to look with an expression of unbearable love and sadness at her daughter, who looked suddenly so small and fragile. The forest light fell upon her translucent skin curiously, and Gimlîth noted how undeniably _ different _her daughter looked from the other citizens of their beautiful island. "I am sorry I have delayed this for so long, my love. It was wrong of me to keep you here-Númenor is no longer any place for an elf."

Azruarî moved forward to take her mother's hands and kiss them.

"You are not to blame for that-this is my home, mother. I belong here too."

"Perhaps you did once, but no longer. I followed you to this clearing because I felt a chill-as if someone whispered in my ear that you were in danger. Someone is watching over you, Azruarî. I know not by whom, but now you are summoned away from this place. Once we make funeral arrangements for Gimilzagar, Sildaner, and Yualo, we must leave."

"Where? Where can we go?"

"I know not. We must put our faith in the sea and the sky to guide us, as we always have. Aglarân, I shall escort my daughter back to the city and inform the families of the attack. Would you deal with this," Gimlîth glared down upon the bound man with eyes full of contempt, "child killer until I return?"

"With pleasure, Captain," said Aglarân, his voice little more than a snarl as he sneered down at the bowman.

As Azruarî left the clearing, and her blood slowly cooled from her state of fear and alertness, she finally smelled the odor of the blood mixed with the fragrance of the trees. Sorrow overwhelmed her and she walked beside her mother in silent tears. She passed through the fields of flowers and beneath the wondrous trees, walked along the shore as a stranger in her own land. Her feet left no mark in the soft sand and the breeze did not disturb her wild hair. Only once did the world touch her-as she passed under her favorite Laurinquë tree, her head brushed one of the low-hanging clusters of golden flowers, and a single blossom caught in her dark tangles.

* * *

In the year 2803 of the Second Age, Lady Gimlîth, Captain of the Marine Guard of Andúnië, and her daughter, Azruarî Half-Elven, departed Númenor on a ship bound for the haven of Pelargir. Their voyage was watched by curious eyes, and guided by hands unknown. On the night they left their beloved city by the sea, a detachment of King's Men infiltrated Andúnië and slaughtered four of the Night Guard, acting on a rumor of a young half-elf living among the Faithful as one of their own.

In years to come, Gimlîth, never one of much superstition, would speak of a woman's voice, deep and commanding, that had come to her in a dream, roused her from her bed, and ordered her to board the first ship departing that night.

So began the journey of Azruarî the Wanderer. Not for many lives of men would she come to rest again.

* * *

**Notes and terms:**

King's Men: faction of Numenoreans who began to reject the Valar and persecute elves during the Second Age  
Elendili: Elf-friends, Numenoreans who remained faithful to the Valar and hospitable to the Elves  
Andustar: The Western province of Numenor

A point of clarification: Tolkien had two possible versions of arrival of the Blue Wizards. In the first, the Blue Wizards arrived with the other three Istari and soon disappeared into the East and were rarely heard from again. In the second, they came to Middle Earth around the time of the War of the Elves and Sauron along with Glorfindel with the task of helping the elves and men against Sauron. I am going with the second version for the purposes of this story, since I find wizards fascinating and otherwise I couldn't get much mileage out of them.


	2. The Spindrift

"In that book which is my memory,

On the first page of the chapter that is the day when I first met you,

Appear the words, 'Here begins a new life'."

-Dante, _La Vita Nuova_

_2803 SA: Lothlórien_

Through the golden light of the forest, music and laughter permeated the air like intoxicating pollen. The festivities had now continued for seven days straight, with no pause for sleep. Always at the center of the swirl of silk and color, a golden lord danced tirelessly with every pretty elf maiden of the kingdom of Lothlórien, his sweet, deep voice ringing out in song through the forest, strong as the foundations of the mountains, intimate as the rustle of satin sheets. His hair was golden as Mallorn trees, his skin smooth and luminous as if made from living marble. He danced like sunlight on water. To look upon him was to love him.

But with his arm wrapped around the waist of silver-haired Gladien Lúthil, widely acknowledged to be the loveliest maiden in the realm save Galadriel and Celebrian themselves, the golden elf felt only a deep and echoing boredom. He smiled at his perfect companion, bringing a delicate flush to her cheeks, and prayed silently to Manwë for something new.

As if in direct response, the lady of the wood herself, Galadriel, came sweeping at that moment into the clearing. Though the music and dancing continued uninterrupted, every elf watched her as discreetly as they could. The lady of the wood caught Glorfindel's eyes and inclined her head to him courteously, but he heard her summons echo through his head like a bugle.

Instantly, Glorfindel disentangled himself unceremoniously from his beautiful companion with a whispered promise to find her chambers that night, and hurried to follow his host as the music began where it had stopped. A blond wood-elf joined him at the border of the dance floor.

Cestedir was not beautiful, as elves went. He was a bit heavyset, of slightly awkward proportions, and his hair did not shine quite as it should. His hands were calloused from long years at war, and his nose had been broken and poorly healed several times. He spoke without artifice-or, indeed, any art at all. Nevertheless, in the realm of Lothlórien, Glorfindel had not found another elf he liked as much as the plain captain.

"For an elf who was just holding one of the prettiest elves on this side of the Misty Mountains, you seem terribly eager to run off with one of the ugliest, Glorfindel," Cestedir said, grinning.

"Indeed, my friend, for nobody enhances my good looks as you do," Glorfindel replied with a bright smile. His friend chuckled good-naturedly.

"Called you too, did she?" By his tone, he could only have meant one 'she.'

"So it seems."

"Perhaps you might not have hopped to it quite as readily if you had been in different company… She bores the life out of you, doesn't she?" Cestedir said knowingly, jerking his head in the direction of the dancing elves. "Lúthil is as pretty as a sliver of moonbeam, but her light has a way of putting a man to sleep."

"Everyone bores me nowadays, Cestedir. After all these millennia, one ball is much like another," Glorfindel said, feeling some chivalric obligation to defend his companion. "But," he added reluctantly, "the three hours that the esteemed lady spent describing the seating plans for her next fete may not have helped."

Cestedir guffawed, but the two elves fell silent as they approached the doors of the Lady Galadriel's private study. Though she was not the official ruler of the land-that distinction belonged to King Amdir-it was no secret that her magic and cleverness was the driving force behind the kingdom. She concealed the steel blade of her power beneath the silk and finery of a lady of the court, and ruled the realm with soft whispers.

Glorfindel raised his hand to knock at the door, but it swung open of its own accord. The Lady Galadriel stood at the large window at the far end of the room, her eyes on the moon shining through the golden leaves.

"Enter." As usual, Glorfindel couldn't quite tell if the words were spoken aloud or simply resonating in his mind. She turned as they walked into the room, crafted from pale linden wood, starkly bare of decoration, always perfectly illuminated despite the lack of any apparent sources of light. "Please, take your seats," she urged, the image of a solicitous hostess.

Glorfindel lowered himself into a perfect, simply-constructed chair as Cestedir did the same, clearly reluctant to be seated in the presence of a great lady.

"I hope," said the lady, "that you have been enjoying the festivities, Lord Glorfindel. I understand that the young ladies of Lothlórien are overjoyed at your presence." Glorfindel acknowledged the compliment, feeling slightly impatient at the formalities. Apparently detecting his frustration, Galadriel smiled with a tinge of wickedness in her clear eyes. "Forgive me, I have become too accustomed to the ways of this court. I shall speak directly. The Dunedain haven Pelargir is under attack from the sea. I have seen a great shadow approaching the city-if it falls to its attackers, the fate of the Númenóreans will be dark indeed."

"Who attacks them?" asked Cestedir, struggling to understand the lady's sudden engagement in the affairs of Men.

"Their very own kin. The proud and cruel Númenóreans who have rejected the Valar themselves. They have driven elves from their midst, attacked and slaughtered those among them who remain faithful. Pelargir is a shelter for those who still look to the Valar."

Both of her guests remained unusually silent, waiting to understand her purpose in summoning them.

"I wish to aid them," she said finally. Now it was her voice that was tinged with impatience. Cestedir and Glorfindel exchanged a shocked look. The elves of Lorien were not known for their compassion for the strife of the kingdoms of other races.

"Aid them, milady? You?"

"Is that so difficult to believe?"

The resounding silence from the two male elves gave her the answer. Finally she sighed and shook her head.

"I fear I have too long neglected my responsibility to this land I have chosen to inhabit. The troubles of Númenor will reach us all in the end. But I confess, I have another reason."

_Finally, perhaps she will reach the point._

Galadriel's lip quirked up again in amusement as her eyes met Glorfindel's.

"I have seen a child. An elven girl, wild and changeable as the waves. A spindrift born of the sea and formed by the wind. She dwells in Pelargir, upon the edge of a knife."

"Milady… you wish us to march into Men's battles for a single elven child?"

"I do. Or, more accurately perhaps, I know that it is what must be done. She has a part to play yet, and if we do not reach her, someone else will."

Glorfindel could not help but feel unsatisfied by this answer, but he saw in Galadriel's fair face that she knew nothing more that she could tell them.

"It shall be done, milady," he said, bowing his head. Cestedir nodded hesitantly in agreement. "We shall ride with a detachment of thirty soldiers this very night." Galadriel bestowed a grateful smile upon them.

"Thank you, my friends. I shall not forget it. You will find her always in the eye of the storm."

Glorfindel and Cestedir rode out that night, a company of shining golden warriors thundering behind them. As he rode with the chill wind whipping through his hair, galloping towards combat in lands unknown, Glorfindel felt exhilarated beyond anything he had experienced in a thousand years or more.

* * *

_Meanwhile in Pelargir_

The one known in Pelargir as Gimilzagar paced silently through the city streets, watchful eyes scanning the shadows. The light-footed sentry had not slept for many days, preferring instead to wait until Gimlîth had fallen asleep, then to slip out of their modest room and patrol the sleeping city. Perhaps it was simply the discomfort of the bandages wrapped tightly around "his" newly swelling breasts, or the lack of the fragrant trees whose scents had always lulled the youth to sleep. In Andustar, Azruarî would have warded away the insomnia by climbing onto a comfortable branch of her Laurinquë tree and allowing the wind to rock her to sleep. Here, she had only the stifling little room and strict orders not to risk being seen by the enemy, lest they identify her either as female or elven or, Valar forbid, both.

Despite the constant assaults on Pelargir from allegedly rogue ships of Umbar (obviously informally sanctioned by the lords of that violent city), most of the citizens of the haven were sound asleep that night. Azruarî felt quite alone, standing on the cobblestones of a strange city, called only by a name that was not her own. She tugged through her shirt at the bindings at her chest. They had grown much more constrictive over the course of the few months. The smell of the sea was different here, mixed with smoke and dust, instead of the leaves of Yavannamírë trees. But still, breathing in the crisp, salty breeze restored her as it ruffled her hair affectionately like an old friend. For a moment, the tightness around her chest alleviated slightly. Then, far in the distance, she heard clattering, yells, and the shrill whinny of frightened horses. She closed her eyes and focused on the source of the noise-to the north, the clashing of blades of uncommon make, almost musical in quality.

Azruarî ran to the warning bell of the city and used all her weight to pull the alarm. Then she ran directly towards the source of the fighting. If she had paused to consider her options, she might have felt some fear-not of the violence ahead, but of the mother's wrath behind her.

* * *

Glorfindel cursed as men swarmed from the trees to ambush the company of elves. They had galloped for a day, never resting their horses, to reach the city by the sea. Weary and hungry for something more than traveling rations of lembas, they had grown reckless as they approached the seemingly peaceful city. Now they found themselves assailed by archers from the trees, then attacked by infantry with long, curved swords. Suddenly outnumbered, his men fell back into formation, slaughtering the attackers from their mounts. Distracted by combat, he barely noted the clanging of the warning bells in the city-nor did he hear the whispers of the trees as light feet ran through them towards the hidden archers.

Only when the ambushing archers began to shriek and fall from the branches with daggers in their backs did he look around to find his new allies. His keen eyes picked out what appeared to be several whirlwinds of spinning steel dancing in the trees, launching small knives with fearsome precision. Then, less subtle, the gates of the city burst open and a company of ten mounted warriors in shining Númenórean armor came riding through, cutting through the swarming infantry ruthlessly. Within seconds, the survivors of the attack had fled and peace descended upon the strange party of elves and Men. A slight figure dropped from the trees with feline grace, followed by four more, and spoke in a sharp, commanding, but very young voice.

"What in all of Arda do you think you're doing?"

Taken aback, Glorfindel focused his eyes on the small figure standing straight-backed to confront his immense horse.

"I am Lord Glorfindel, Captain of the Armies of Lindon. We are come from the kingdom of Lorien to aid the Faithful in their fight against-"

"Did you send word you were coming?" interrupted another of the small figures, this one with a gentler, distinctly feminine voice.

"There was no time to-"

"Pelargir has been under attack for a long time, Captain-there is no more urgency now than there was a year ago. If you had sent word, we might have warned you about the ambushes along this road." The first voice again. It belonged to a slender boy with gaudy red bandanna over a mop of unruly black curls.

"We planned to utilize the element of surprise," cut in Cestadir, taking pity on his verbally assailed friend.

"Well, as you can see, it was a damned fool plan," said the boy casually. "Unless you meant to deploy it against yourselves, that is." The gentle-voiced girl nudged him.

"They were only trying to help, Gimilzagar," she said reproachfully.

"And, more importantly," said a new voice, "if anyone is to call this delegation damned fools, it must be someone with more authority. Back to the city with you now, little rogues." The mounted Men parted respectfully to allow the speaker to come forward as the young knife-throwers melted reluctantly into the shadows. The rider had removed her helmet, revealing a beautiful but weatherbeaten face. Long black tresses tumbled down her shoulders, and laughter hid at the corners of her full mouth.

"Well met, friends. I am Gimlîth of Andúnië. Allow me to escort your party into the city-there is much to discuss."

Slightly dazed, Glorfindel followed Gimlîth and her men through the gates of Pelargir with nary a word. Their hostess allowed little discussion that night, insisting instead on preparing hot meals for the company and drawing them baths. Perhaps as penance for his rudeness, Gimilzagar and his band of whirling warriors-none of whom could have been much past the start of adolescence-were set to work in the kitchen.

"You must forgive my son his rudeness," Gimlîth told Glorfindel lightly. "He has the most horrid habit of speaking his mind."

But Glorfindel's eyes were following the girl who stood beside Gimilzagar, evaluating her carefully. Her skin was pale and luminous, her large eyes clear and gray. She had an ethereal, unmistakably elvish beauty. The other three boys who followed Gimilzagar like shadows looked similar.

"These children-your son's friends: they are elflings, are they not? How did they come to be here?"

"Yes, they are elves. They are orphans of those ambushed by King's Men near our city. We have given them names in our own tongue in the hopes of better concealing them, but they tend to stand out."

"And do they always follow your son so readily?" His hostess smiled ruefully.

"I'm afraid so. Ever since we arrived six months ago."

"Are these the only elf children in Pelargir?" he asked.

"Oh, yes I think so. Gimilzagar knows all the young people around here, and he keeps a close eye out for the elves-they are in far more danger than anyone else in the city."

Glorfindel studied the elf girl, slightly puzzled. She was the only female in the group, and he had certainly found her in the center of a storm of sorts. But she seemed gentle, even shy. Certainly not "wild and changeable." Indeed, though if the dark lady before him was to believed, she was the only elven girl, she seemed to fulfill no other part of Galadriel's description. Perhaps her words had carried more embellishment than substance, as they often did.

"My lady..." Glorfindel began, uncertain of how to continue, "we did not come purely out of concern for Pelargir." The dark lady raised a brow.

"My lord," she replied, the words pronounced with a hint of satire, "I do not wish to insult your powers of dissimulation, but I doubt that anyone in all the city will be much surprised by that. We are not accustomed to the honor of elves concerning themselves with our affairs. I suspect," she continued, "that you are here for the elflings. We welcome it-they are in great danger here, and much in need of their own kind. I do, however, have one question." She fixed upon him a dark and penetrating stare. Had he been a lesser elf, with less experience fighting Balrogs, he might have squirmed.

"Ask it, milady."

"Why now? They have all been here for over five years. When I arrived, they had long given up hope of retrieval, despite many messages sent to the lords of your kingdoms."

Glorfindel hesitated as he looked into the woman's perceptive black eyes. He felt that it would be a great mistake to lie to her.

"A lady of great power in Lorien sent us to retrieve an elven girl from Pelargir. She has Seen that this girl has some part to play, and that she must be helped to develop her abilities."

Gimlîth's eyes widened and darted towards the children, then dropped swiftly to her hands.

"I will not allow them to become pawns, Lord Glorfindel," she said sharply, the honorific sounding almost accusatory. Her knuckles whitened as she clenched her clasped hands. "These children have been neglected for many years, left in the path of terrible things. Several have died waiting for a gallant company such as yours to come for them. But now, when one of them may have a 'part to play,' whatever that means-"

"Such is the way of this world, my lady," he interrupted, balking at her rebuke. "Did you expect the elf kingdoms to risk the lives of their soldiers for what may very well have been a trap?"

"Indeed, your people have never much trusted ours. And now you ask us to trust _you _with the lives of children we have come to love and cherish as our own."

She began to rise as Glorfindel scrambled to undo the offense he had given.

"Lady Gimlîth, truly I meant no accusation-"

"I am no lady, sir. But I _do _strive to protect the people of this city from many things, including the machinations of the great lords and ladies of distant halls of power. Goodnight, my lord. Welcome to Pelargir." She left, followed by Gimilzagar and his shadows.

"I may be wrong," said Cestedir, settling beside Glorfindel and reaching over to munch a carrot from his friend's plate, "but I think we may be damned fools."

* * *

The next morning, Glorfindel awoke in an uncomfortable cot, curled up on his side so that his legs would not fall off the end. Gimlîth had reserved a set of army barracks for their particular use, and it had not appeared to occur to her to offer better lodgings to the commanders themselves-an oversight for which he grudgingly respected her. He rose and dressed swiftly and left the barracks silently to meet the sunrise, as was his custom. The city was silent and empty, and the pink light fell upon the cobblestones. Apart from the sentries and the bakers, all slept peacefully for a few hours more. Well, almost everyone-balanced upon a tall chimney, standing perfectly erect and alert, a single slight figure faced the rising sun with almost defiant posture. Gimilzagar.

Lit thus by the sun's pale blush, the figure seemed to glow. As the sun rose above the horizon, the boy leapt from the chimney top, and Glorfindel let out a cry of alarm and rushed forward to save the falling child, but he was too far to do anything. He watched as the boy landed lightly in a feline crouch and rose casually, languidly.

_That is no mortal child, _Glorfindel realized, as the boy turned towards the source of the cry with an amused grin.

"Why good morning, Lord Glorfindel, Captain of Lindon! I trust you rested well?" The smiled that played about the corners of his full mouth-so like his mother's-suggested that he knew such a thing to be impossible in barracks such as those. In the brightening sunlight, Glorfindel could finally see what had been concealed to his weary eyes the night before. Gimilzagar stood slim, straight, and luminous. So full of vitality and radiant beauty was he that standing thus in the morning's first light, he could have passed for a young Earendil himself.

Though in features he was much like his mother, down to the freckles scattered over his cheeks and the thick, expressive brows, there was a delicate translucency to his skin and a fluidity movement that could not belong to any but an elf. Last, and most revealing were the boy's eyes: where his mother's were dark and fathomless as the new moon, his were bright with all the colors of the sea. With every shift of the light, the colors shifted too, and his every fleeting emotion was expressed in that flashing, turbulent gaze. The red silk bandanna that the boy wore tied over his curly dark hair in order to conceal the pointed tips of his ears no longer sufficed to conceal the boy's clearly elven roots.

"Good morning, Gimilzagar Half-Elven!" Glorfindel replied with a wicked smile of his own and a sardonic bow. "Indeed, I slept passing well-please convey my thanks to your mother for her hospitality. And please, Glorfindel will do; no need to stand on ceremony when we're already such friends that you've called me a damned fool."

Gimilzagar blanched for a moment, then plucked off his bandana with a rueful smile.

"It's that obvious, is it?"

"It is to me. And, I'd wager, to any elf who saw you for more than a moment or two."

"I suspected so, but it is crucial to conceal my lineage from the men of Umbar for as long as possible. Please forgive my rudeness last night, milord-the situation in Pelargir is delicate and suspicion of strangers comes perhaps too naturally nowadays. You are most welcome here."

"It is forgotten," Glorfindel said with a smile, and proffered his hand. Gimilzagar's slender, long-fingered hand was engulfed by Glorfindel's broad palm, but his handshake was firm and unshrinking. Indeed, the boy was far shorter and smaller than Glorfindel had initially realized, for he stood so proudly that, though the top of his head only reached the middle of Glorfindel's chest, he appeared to occupy far more space. "We were foolish to enter the fray without consulting your people first. But truly, we do hope to help Pelargir's plight, and any explanation of the situation of the city would be welcome."

The boy stood back and scrutinized the elf lord for a moment, then appeared to come to a decision.

"It would be better to show you. Are you an adequate climber?"

* * *

In years to come, Glorfindel would wonder by what flight of madness he found himself clinging for dear life to the side of a stone tower, following a fey, reckless adolescent who clambered up the sheer face of the building with infuriating ease. The tower had looked only moderately tall when Gimilzagar had led him there and told him that it was the best vantage point in the city, and somehow his suggestion that they scale the side had not seemed so altogether preposterous. By the time they clambered onto the top and stood upon the roof, Glorfindel was thoroughly shaken and out of breath. His companion, however, was laughing merrily, thoroughly exhilarated. He handed Glorfindel his red bandanna so that he might mop his noble brow and bounded to the very edge of the tower, facing south. By now the sun had risen properly, and a sea breeze toyed mischievously with their hair.

"Well done, my Lord! Well done indeed! There was a moment there when I thought I had certainly led you to your death-but you are made of stern stuff indeed!"

"Does your mother know that you're mad?" Glorfindel demanded between heaving breaths.

"Oh, at the very least she must suspect it by now. But if you mean does she know that I climb up here… I believe that is one of the few secrets of the city that she still is not privy to."

"To whom does this accursed tower belong? Surely they would not approve of mad children scrambling up the walls." At this, the grin dropped abruptly from the boy's face and he became suddenly solemn.

"This tower no longer has a master, nor even a name, except Minas Areneth*, for once it belonged to a great lord of my people, a noble leader from the ruling house of Andunie. He is said to have become a powerful and ageless sorcerer, and he protected the colonies of Numenor with his magic. But he turned gradually to darkness and tyranny, and lived long-far longer than his natural life should have permitted, and he was called the Witch-King of the Sea. But finally he was driven from his tower by the Elendili who arrived here over two hundred years ago, and then he vanished. It was then that Pelargir was established as a haven around this tower of greatness-that-was. Now the tower is used for meetings of the generals of the city, but never occupied for long, lest the shadows that linger here drive more good Men to madness."

Glorfindel felt his stomach drop-the story was too familiar to be a coincidence.

"And the Witch-King? Is there any notion of what became of him?"

"It is said by the oldest of the people here that he was seen for many years wandering the shore, by turns cursing the faithless ingratitude of his subjects and pleading forgiveness for his fall from grace. They say he speaks of a terrible gift, so fair and so fell that it stripped him of his humanity before he even realized it was happening. Are you quite well, my lord?" For the blood had drained from Glorfindel's fair face as his companion spoke. He shook himself internally and turned to smile upon Gimilzagar.

"Yes, indeed. Forgive me-it was but a passing shadow upon my heart."

Gimilzagar shook his head and laid a small hand on Glorfindel's shoulder.

"Do not apologize to me, for that story casts a dark shadow upon my heart as well. That sorcerer king, tyrant of the shore, was my very blood. For I am descended from the same house as he. But he crossed the sea to make his fortunes. In Numenor he was considered a great man, and good, and a true supporter of the elf-friends. And he was the twin brother, alike in every aspect, of my direct ancestor. It must be ten generations now that separates our two lines. But his blood runs in my veins, and his silhouette casts a long shadow indeed. But come, if we are to speak of evils, let them at least be evils that we can redress now."

Gimilzagar beckoned Glorfindel to the southern edge of the tower, from which they could see clearly for miles. He pointed towards a dark city, tall and sprawling, upon the coast in the far South.

"That is Umbar. It is from there that troops are sent-unofficially, you understand-to assail our borders. But to the east along the river Harnen, that," now the boy pointed to a much closer stronghold, a large stone fortress with smoke billowing from thousands of chimneys, "is the most immediate threat to our city, for there they are building weapons that will crumble our city's walls with no difficulty at all. Minas Mornosp*, we call it. But the men of Umbar call it the Tower of the Dawn."

"How do you know what they are building there?" Glorfindel asked, with only half his mind on the answer, for his eyes were fixed upon the terrible tower, on the blackening of the sky above it and the terrible scar upon the earth around it, where no trees grew.

"I have seen it. I slipped through the gates one night, disguised in the clothes a fallen King's Man. I passed their sentries and walked into their workshops. They have great flaming battering rams, catapults of terrible power, smithies burning day and night to forge terrible swords of dark tempered steel. The Elendili are good craftsmen, my lord, and their weapons are strong and faithful. But they are not willing to destroy the land and defile the forest. They cannot keep up with such a force."

Glorfindel looked at the small boy with some alarm, imagining this child, barely beginning adolescence, dressed in a killer's clothes and walking alone into an enemy camp.

"How in the name of the Valar could you have passed for a soldier of Umbar? Why, you cannot be older than 50 years old!"

"I would have you know that I am 53 this Thursday," said Gimilzagar loftily.

"That is _nothing _for an elf child," Glorfindel pointed out. "You are scarcely halfway to your maturity."

"That may be so, but I have a way of allowing people to see what they expect to see. They did not expect to see a child walk into their stronghold, and so they… didn't." Glorfindel frowned, but did not pursue the matter further.

"If they do indeed have such weapons, it is a grave matter indeed. This city is fair and strong, but it is not built for siege."

"I have urged the council of generals-well, I've urged my mother, who has their ear-to begin gathering resources to fortify the city. But it will not be enough. This is not a fortress. But the weapons are not yet finished, and we have time yet to act to destroy Minas Mornosp once and for all." Glorfindel was surprised into laughter by this absurd proposal, but quickly his mirth faded when he saw that Gimilzagar's youthful face was set and solemn.

"Destroy that fortress of stone and steel? My dear boy, that is even more implausible than withstanding siege within the walls of this city! How do you propose to destroy such a behemoth?"

"Why, the way all power is destroyed, my lord," replied the elf-child with a sly smile. "From within."

To this riddle Glorfindel could not find an answer, but he was saved the necessity of inventing one by the arrival of Gimlîth and an escort of three members of the Pelargir Guard. She burst out of a trapdoor in the tower top, and skidded onto the landing breathless and wild-eyed.

"_What,_" she gasped out, "in the name of all that is holy do you think you are doing, you thrice-cursed, Valier-damned _fools_?"

Glorfindel took a moment to appreciate that indeed, he had now been called a damned fool three times since arriving in Pelargir not even twelve hours ago.

_Perhaps there's something to it, _he mused. Beside him, Gimilzagar shifted guiltily. A moment ago, he had been a solemn warrior, plotting impossible feats of valor. Now, before his mother's wrath, he was suddenly a straying child caught in some silly mischief.

"I… fancied a climb?" the boy hazarded, attempting a winning smile. A thought suddenly occurred to Glorfindel, and he too rounded upon his small new friend.

"There were _stairs_?"

* * *

**Translations:**

*Minas Areneth: Sindarin, the tower without a name  
*Minas Mornosp: Sindarin, the tower of black smoke  
Azruari: Adunaic, sea queen  
Gimlith: Adunaic, star lady  
Gimilzagar: Adunaic, star sword


	3. Minas Mornosp

"The senses deceive from time to time, and it is prudent never to trust wholly those who have deceived us even once."

-Rene Descartes

_2803 SA, Pelargir_

The memory of the look of wrath in Gimlîth's black eyes would often haunt Glorfindel in years to come. In some versions that he would later tell, she turned into a dragon and razed the tower to the ground.

However, in actuality she said very little as Gimilzagar explained his fancy for some early-morning exertion, and Glorfindel's gallant attempt to follow in order him to protect him from danger. The boy spoke glibly and amusingly, and by the end of the tale all three of the guardsmen were chuckling surreptitiously (muffling the sound when the dark lady turned her glare upon them). Only in her eyes, which glittered darkly as she looked between them, was her seething fury expressed in full. When Gimilzagar had finished his smooth lies, she rounded on Glorfindel-an impressive feat, since the top of her head came only to his shoulder-and commanded him to leave them and return to the city center, accompanied by the guards. He glanced at his small companion, vaguely worried for him as he stood under his mother's glower. The boy smiled and bid him go.

"She won't throw me off the tower, I assure you. She's put far too much effort into keeping me alive for that."

Glorfindel left reluctantly as Gimlîth muttered something about "sunk costs" under her breath. Then he waited in the city square, hoping to mitigate some of the fallout from their little adventure. Moreover, Gimilzagar's words stuck in his mind, and he pondered the problem of Minas Mornosp at length as he waited.

He would not know for many years what passed between Gimlîth and Gimilzagar, but it must have been a mighty battle indeed, for when they emerged from the great doors of the tower, Gimlîth's will appeared rather broken, and Gimilzagar, though tired and flustered, had a rather smug look on his pretty face. The Lady of Pelargir-for though she repudiated the word, it was clear to him that that was what she was-swept towards him with her son in tow.

"You are willing to aid us in an assault upon Minas Mornosp?" Her voice was like iron as she asked, and he knew that his answer would be binding. Similarly, he knew instantly what his answer must be.

"I am."

"It will be very dangerous."

"Indeed."

"And quite probably entirely futile."

"Agreed."

"Then congratulations, Lord Glorfindel, Captain of Lindon-you're madder than I could have hoped in my wildest dreams."

"Always, my Lady."

* * *

Cestedir took slightly more persuading, and threw Glorfindel many questioning looks as Gimlîth and Gimilzagar walked them through their strategy.

Gimilzagar had gathered several volunteers skilled in stealth, including the elven girl known in Pelargir as Tôdaphêl, but whose true name was in fact Bereneth Amathiel, daughter of Amathon of Greenwood, who had fallen on his way to the grand market at Pelargir, where he had been taking his daughter along for the first time. Her mother had died long ago in childbirth, and as Amathon had little family left in Middle-Earth, no one had ever sent for her. She went despite the best efforts of both Gimilzagar and Gimlîth, hearing all their arts of persuasion and their numerous objections, but smiling serenely. "Where Gimilzagar goes, I too shall go," she repeated, until even Gimilzagar fell into a chair, exhausted. Glorfindel could see now why she followed Gimilzagar into such peril, for she looked upon him with the tenderness of young love, which he did not seem to notice.

Another of the elven orphans, Tamruzîr, who had a skill for all matters mechanical, had also insisted on joining them. Among the volunteers too were several elves from Glorfindel's party, who were skilled in enchantments of stealth, as well as several smiths from Pelargir, who would help dismantle as much of the factory and alarm systems as they could. Carron of Lothlorien, the son of a smith, though he himself had chosen a soldier's life, offered to join them as well.

Glorfindel, too, concerned for the young elves in the stealth party, had volunteered to accompany them for protection. At this, Gimlîth and Gimilzagar had exchanged an incredulous look before turning as one towards him with identically raised brows and crooked smiles.

"My dear Lord Glorfindel," Gimilzagar began, torn between laughter and awkwardness, "surely it is clear to you why that would be unwise, though I am deeply touched by your offer."

"It most certainly is not! I can be just as useful on missions of stealth as in open combat." He felt slightly peeved with the universal bemusement at his offer.

"But my friend, surely someone has pointed out to you by now that you…" Gimilzagar trailed off, seeking the right words.

"I _what_?"

"You… you glow a bit, My Lord," Gimilzagar finished, when it became apparent that no one would help him. "Not distastefully, at all, you understand. It's quite fetching, in fact! But a tad hard to contend with where stealth is required." Gimlîth nodded in agreement, as did several others, both elves and Men, around the table.

"I do _not _glow," Glorfindel replied hotly, oddly stung.

"Well, you do a bit, mate," added Cestedir apologetically. "First thing I noticed when I met you, actually." It took no small effort for the conspirators to persuade Glorfindel that his abilities would be better employed commanding the cavalry than in the infiltration, but through a concerted alliance of Elves and Men, he was forced finally to concede.

Thus, with a small group, made for stealth, Gimilzagar would once again slip the gates of Minas Mornosp and destroy as much of the weaponry of the tower as possible before attacking the sentries and opening the gates to Glorfindel and Gimlîth's mounted forces.

Between Glorfindel's company and the soldiers begrudgingly afforded to the "fool's errand" by the Council of Generals, they would have a force of sixty men. Usually, this number would not be near enough for such an errand, but as Gimlîth described their plans to draw away the tower's soldiers to attack the main road to Umbar using an army of strategic sounds and reflections of light, Glorfindel and even Cestedir found themselves reluctantly convinced that perhaps they could indeed prevail in this mad endeavor.

* * *

_On the eve of the attack_

Bereneth stood before a looking glass, struggling with the cotton bandages that Gimlîth had given her. She tried pinning one end beneath her right arm and wrapping the length around her body with her left hand, but she found herself ever more tangled in cotton. To her relief, she heard a decisive knock on her door.

"Enter!" She heard the door open and close. "Thank goodness you've arrived, Lady Gimlîth, for I cannot make any sense of these bindings." She turned to find not Gimlîth, but Gimilzagar, dressed in the ill-fitting garb of one of the captured King's Men, standing beside the door, his eyes averted courteously.

"Forgive me, Tôdaphêl, I didn't realize-do you need any help?"

Bereneth blushed to the roots of her ears and gathered the bandages to her, looking away. It was not an entirely unwelcome moment, but now she didn't know what to do.

"No, not at all-I was expecting your mother, that is all. She said she'd be in to help me with these."

"I believe she was accosted by General Sapthan … she might be occupied for a while, for the man has never been known to stop talking except under pain of death. Here, let me assist you with those. There is no need to be self-conscious, for I have spent enough time helping in the healing halls that there is little I have not seen."

It was with some disappointment that Bereneth realized that she did not for a moment doubt the chastity of his intentions. So, carefully holding a length of bandage to protect her modesty, she allowed him to wrap the cloth securely around her chest, flattening her breasts. His hands worked swiftly and expertly, never once so much as brushing her skin.

"It will be quite sore and uncomfortable," he said absently as he worked, "but you shall be too busy to notice, for the most part."

"Oh indeed? You appear to have no small experience in the ways of breast-binding, for a boy. Why, I look the part more than you do!" He smiled enigmatically, but said nothing. When he had finished, she was as flat-chested as he was.

"There. You must forgive my mother's insistence on the matter, but the penalty for women in warfare can be terrible."

"I know. She was wise to suggest it. But it is odd… I do not feel myself at all."

"No," Gimilzagar sighed, meeting her eyes in the mirror with a solemn gaze that she rarely saw from him. "I imagine not. Bereneth," his tone changed suddenly to urgency, and she shivered when he used her true name, "there is still time. There is no reason for you to endanger yourself on this errand of fools. It is not your battle to fight."

"It is more my battle than yours, Gimilzagar of Andunië," she replied calmly. "I have lived here for many years-far longer than you have. The people of this city have cared for me as one of their own. Gladly would I die for them, if that is my fate."

"But-"

"And, more importantly," she murmured, mustering her courage and turning to face him. They were standing very close together, and she stood far taller than he did, "I think you know that where you go, no matter how perilous and foolhardy, I shall follow. For I would not be parted from the one I love, even in death." Then she stood very still, her breath paused in quiet suspense as comprehension spread over his face. He looked at her with immense compassion and sadness and clasped her hand in his.

"Oh, Bereneth, my dearest and most loyal friend. I should have seen this." She watched him in confusion as he unclasped his hide shirt and moved her hand to feel beneath. Her fingers first touched collarbone, then traced a gentle swell of soft flesh downward, where it was bound and contained by bandages just like hers. She retrieved her hand slowly, fighting back tears. Painfully, she forced a tranquil smile to her face.

"I see. Well, that certainly explains a great deal-I have never liked a boy nearly as much as I like you, after all."

"Bereneth, I am sorry indeed for deceiving you, for of all that I have met in Middle Earth, you are the closest to my heart."

"You could have trusted me with this, you know. I would have protected your secret."

"I know. I have no excuse," murmured the strange girl, bowing her head. "But if it was only your love of Gimilzagar of Andunië that drove you towards danger, consider yourself freed."

"Now you wound me in earnest, for though I no longer know who you are, you are still my closest friend. And, dear stranger, I would follow you to the ends of the Earth."

Tears sprang to the girl's eyes, and she embraced Bereneth more tightly than she ever had before.

"Azruarî. My name is Azruarî."

* * *

As Azruarî slipped quietly out of Bereneth's room and made her way swiftly down the hall, she found herself face to face with Glorfindel as he came around the corner.

"Ah, just the madman I was looking for!" cried the elf in his clarion voice. "I wanted to bid you good luck on your mission, since I imagine I cannot dissuade you."

Azruarî smiled and clasped his hand in both of hers, noting its angular beauty with no small fascination-his palms were broad and strong, the fingers elegant but strong as iron. She looked into his eyes, and it was like staring directly into the noontide sun.

"No indeed," she replied, "you cannot."

"Then if I cannot contain you, I shall do my best instead to aid you, my dear little climbing thorn." From his belt, he drew two small leather sheaths, each the length of her forearm. The hilts of the blades they contained were of a dark steel that glinted only in the brightest light. She could not contain a gasp of pleasure as she drew one of the wickedly curved daggers and weighed it in her hands. "That one is called Echiar, the blood thorn. The other is Aegros, the blade of piercing rain. Together may they serve your pirate heart." He fastened the sheaths to her belt and laughed as she immediately drew and examined the weapons in fascination, though in his mirth there was sadness that she did not hear.

"Oh, thank you, Glorfindel! This shall be a grand help to me tonight!"

"Understand me well, boy-these daggers are a _loan._ I expect you to bring them back to me unscathed, is that clear?" She caught the meaning of his words and looked up to meet his serious gaze again.

"A bit bloodied, perhaps, but certainly in one-well, two-pieces, My Lord."

"On that topic, I still have your bandana, though indeed it makes a poor disguise."

Glorfindel ruffled her hair affectionately and made to tie the red silk bandana again around Azruarî's head, but she stopped him and tied the scarf instead around his belt.

"No, keep it for now. Consider it collateral."

The elf lord smiled and inclined his head. Then they walked side by side into the lowering light.

* * *

_Sometime around midnight, The Tower of the Dawn_

From his post upon the tower wall, Hulac of Umbar fancied he could see all the world from Numenor to the Wild Woods of the East. And at the moment, all in his lofty realm appeared to be at peace. He relaxed into his seat upon the tower's edge, perturbed only by the thick smoke that blew now and then from the great chimneys and pipes beneath him. Then, off in the distance towards the south, he heard a distant clatter, as if of armor, and perhaps, the sound of horse's hooves.

He leapt to his feet and looked out towards Umbar. In the distance, mostly concealed by trees, his sharp eyes discerned the glinting of swords and the shine of lustrous horses. He began to count, but the smoke hindered his sight, and he could see only that it was a large force, at least two hundred strong, and that they moved towards the tower. If he squinted, he could even discern the flag they bore-the silver ships of the House of Andunië. So, the cowards thought to take them by surprise! Enraged, Hulac took up his horn, summoning the forces of the tower. Within ten minutes, they poured out of the southern gate of the tower in droves, galloping at full speed towards the invaders. Hulac watched in satisfaction as the dark cloud of the soldiers of the Tower advanced upon their enemies. Only when he turned away from the ride of the army did he see with alarm that the smoke rising into the sky had cleared and that the great smithies appeared to have ground to a halt.

Then, quite suddenly, he died.

* * *

As they waited just within the walls of Pelargir, their eyes glued to the city's spy glasses, Glorfindel found his insides gnawed by anxiety. Not for himself, but for the young half-elf and his followers, who tossed themselves into danger with such relish and abandon. He glanced over at Gimlîth, who stood beside him, apparently quite tranquil. She seemed to feel his eyes upon her, for she fixed him with a sidelong gaze and smiled wryly.

"Something on your mind, My Lord?"

"No! No, nothing at all…" he trailed off into silence. "Except," he began again, unable to contain himself, "this waiting is driving me out of my senses and I cannot fathom-"

"How I bear it? Having my only son, a mere child, fighting on the front lines?"

"How can you allow it? I have never had children of my own, but I would be driven quite mad if they were in the constant danger that Gimilzagar seeks out."

At this, Gimlîth laughed, and the sound was lighter and sweeter than he could ever have expected from the dark lady of Pelargir.

"My dear Glorfindel, I do not _allow _that child to do anything. I admit, for a time I attempted to contain him, to protect him. But he is a spindrift of the sea," something niggled at the back of Glorfindel's mind, but he was far too distracted to pay it any attention, "and will know no bonds nor shackles even for his own safety. And in time, I have come reluctantly to be thankful that my child is fierce and brave and free, and driven only by his own wild spirit. And if I must suffer in fear, at least I know that in his heart he is good and kind, and that the flame that drives him will sustain him in dark times."

In agonies of suspense, Glorfindel watched the northern gates of Minas Mornosp. He heard distantly the galloping of the forces of the tower as they sped off towards the south, then a great clashing and groaning from within the tower, as though its immense heart of black iron had stopped. Then, precisely on time, the gates were thrown open.

Flooded with fierce joy, Glorfindel leapt from the wall and mounted his horse, and rode finally into battle.

* * *

For a time, everything went precisely to plan, and the forces of Pelargir prevailed effortlessly over their enemies. Indeed, they had not suffered a single casualty, and only a few of the men of the smoking tower still stood. Glorfindel cut through swaths of enemies with great sweeps of his shining sword, and his glowing form drove them back in terror-now that it had been pointed out to him, he felt no small self-consciousness about it, for under the dark smoke of the tower it was impossible to ignore that he did indeed emit a faint golden radiance that lit the floor beneath him. Then Glorfindel raised his eyes for a moment and saw Gimilzagar running triumphantly out of the great smithy, followed by Carron and Bereneth.

"Back! Everyone back! For the Tower of Rising Smoke will be laid to ash and rubble today!" cried the boy, his voice ringing out proud and clear over the din of the battle. Glorfindel and Gimlîth cried out the command to retreat in Sindarin, and their bright company surged out of the tower back through the northern gate, slaughtering the remaining King's Men as they went. But one had slipped away, and threw himself now in the path of the saboteurs. He made to attack Bereneth first, with a long, cruelly sharp curving sword. But Gimilzagar, in the lead, uttered a terrible animal cry and launched himself at the attacker with his dark daggers drawn and slipped beneath the assailant's defenses long enough cut his right hand. The great sword clattered to the floor, and for a moment the boy appeared to prevail easily. Then, from the folds of his dark cloak, the enemy drew a knife and sank it deep between the boy's ribs, mere inches from his heart, just as Gimilzagar slit his throat with Echiar.

Glorfindel, watching in horror from his horse, wheeled around and swept down upon the saboteurs. Bereneth he pulled onto the horse behind him and bid her hold on for dear life. Carron grabbed Gimlîth's hand and swung himself onto her horse easily. With his other hand, Glorfindel pulled Gimilzagar up in front of him by the scruff of his collar and cradled him gently in one arm. The boy was still holding on to the dagger with knuckles white as death, and the stars were reflected in his bright eyes as he smiled up at the sky.

"Look, Glorfindel!" he murmured in a strangled voice. "The smoke has cleared! We have won!"

"Yes, little pirate. A great victory indeed." Glorfindel hoped that he concealed the fear in his voice as he smiled down upon the dying boy.

Glorfindel pressed his horse forward with as smooth a gait as he could manage, not looking back even as Minas Mornosp exploded into flame and rubble behind them.


	4. The Singer

"Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more.

Men were deceivers ever,

One foot in sea, and one on shore,

To one thing constant never.

Then sigh not so, but let them go,

And be you blithe and bonny,

Converting all your sounds of woe

Into hey nonny, nonny. "

-William Shakespeare

_2731 SA: Andúnië, Númenor_

Finally it came to pass that a ship from Tol Eressea landed upon the shore of Andustar-a white swan gliding through the twilight like a dream. And Narthanes, beacon of the western shore, greeted them with her vivid smile and welcomed them with open arms, though her heart broke like a wave upon the bow.

She ran to announce the ship's arrival to their guest. He greeted the news with a joyful smile and departed, leaving the lady standing in a darkening hall alone with her secret grief. Only the shadows heard her speak the tender words that had grown unbidden in her heart for all those months, as she professed her love to the night. Then she returned to the great hall of her father's court and passed the night in song and dance, and the elves of Tol Eressea rejoiced in the radiance of the dark lady and her starry hair, and much admired were the songs that Glirron sang that night in her honor.

Only Lord Baralin bore witness to the change in his daughter's dancing eyes, and in the new note of melancholy in his guest's voice of waves. And he knew that if the pair was not soon separated or united, that his wise, glittering daughter would be lost forever to her sorrow.

For a full two months, the ship from Tol Eressea lingered in the bay of Andustar, for winter had fallen cold and cruel over the seas of the West, and by many a fit of bad temper Osse stirred the seas to frothing madness. Indeed, the elves found themselves quite content to remain in the warm halls of the castle of Andunie, and Lord Baralin, constrained by his own principles of hospitality, could not by gentle hints induce them to be on their way.

Glirron, too, seemed inclined to tarry longer in Andustar, and as the days passed Lord Baralin found that the singer of Alqualonde haunted his great hall with ever more melancholy compositions, until even his fellow elves began to question him. Only Narthanes appeared oblivious to the changes in the songs of the elven minstrel, for she found herself suddenly occupied by matters of the realm, and often she absented herself from festivities of the nobility to walk in the markets and alleys of her city and bringing succour and aid to the citizens whose walls were too thin to ward away the unusually cold winter.

Finally, as she paced the market of her beloved city on a cool morning, purchasing warm bread and the last fruit of the season for the elderly and infirm who lived at the outskirts of the southern border of Andunie, news reached her that the ship from Tol Eressea had departed at last. The red apples fell from her hands and rested on the white snow like pools of blood as she shivered in the chilly air. She turned her eyes towards the sea, but they were blank and empty. In her silent trance, her feet took her to the shore, and in the distance the white ship was gliding upon the waves like a phantom. A piercing, frigid rain began to assail her slight form, as once again her tears mingled with the brine, and the sea wind sang of melancholy, far-off things.

Then she felt a warm hand rest upon her trembling shoulder, and she turned. His smile illuminated the world for her like lightning forking across the sky. Then, standing beneath the freezing onslaught of the storm, her skin still salty from weeping, she surrendered unconditionally to her love of him.

"No good can come of this," she whispered, as Glirron's arms encircled her.

"Perhaps not," he murmured into her dark hair. "But we have no choice except to try."

* * *

Lord Baralin sighed with relief as he watched the swan ship depart, thanking the Valar that at last his daughter's heart might know peace again. But even as he watched the white form vanish over the horizon, he felt a sense of foreboding like fingers brushing along his neck. Not until the next morning did he discover the reason for his unease.

Narthanes came before him in his private chambers, more timid and uncertain than he had ever seen her. She told him finally of that which he had known all along in a voice trembling with raw emotion and fear. That, despite her desperate resistance, she had lost her heart to Glirron the Singer. That a life without him was now inconceivable to her.

Baralin watched his daughter's lovely face, and with dismay he saw that to seperate them now would destroy her as surely as driving a sword through her heart.

They spoke for a long time of what was to be done, for no longer could she be his heir. No elf could be accepted as the reigning lord of Andustar without attracting the wrath of the king. He begged Narthanes to reconsider, to remember that her people needed her to lead them. For though Baralin's son was kind and clever, only Narthanes had the wisdom and strength to guide their people through the trials and the growing darkness.

So it was decided that Narthanes would surrender her title, and her noble name, and serve only as an advisor and a captain of Andustar. To discourage the attentions of the young king of Numenor, who had long desired her hand in marriage, she spread rumors of her sickness and frailty, and faded from the eyes of her people like a shadow. And for a time, Narthanes-no-longer and Glirron lived together in blissful happiness in a small cottage beside the sea, shrouded from prying eyes by Baralin's power. The couple's passion blazed day and night, consuming them like a fever for many happy years. But one day, the lady found herself carrying a child, whose life force burned within her and drained her even as it filled her with love.

Glirron paced and watched in mounting anxiety as his wife weakened and her face became paler by the day. He watched life begin to leave her, and in his fear he brought her to the ocean's edge on a calm night when the sea was still. They walked together into the water, and Glirron sang to her softly as the brine swirled about her. Long and cruel was that night, as Glirron struggled with Death for the life of his wife and child. Many times did Glirron pull his lady from the brink of death, and each time his heart shattered anew as he worried that never again would he see her beloved face, even in the Undying Lands. But finally the night was won, and mother and child slept peacefully in the sand as waves rushed in and out to greet them. Glirron gazed upon the face of the child, and for the first time in his life, he knew fear.

_2803 SA, Pelargir_

The next few minutes passed in a blur of activity for Glorfindel as he galloped back to the city gates and burst into the Healing Halls. All obeyed him unquestioningly as he barked for a clean, private bed and wound dressings, and for a strong ointment of Kingsfoil to be brought in haste to his side. This was quickly done, for the elven lord glowed with a mighty purpose, and the beloved Lady Gimlîth stood beside him, silent and pale as the grave. Bereneth stood by the bedside and aided Glorfindel in silence as he impatiently unfastened the boy's disguise, cursing the ornate buckles and clasps of the King's Men's clothing.

Only when he succeeded in opening the jacket and shirt of his young patient was he paused for a moment. Bereneth took over as he reeled back in shock, cutting the bloodied bandages that bound his-nay, _her_-breasts. She worked quickly, freeing her friend from the last remnants of her disguise and applying pressure to the deep wound in the injured girl's chest.

"What now, my lord?" Bereneth's quiet, clear voice shook him out of his paralysis and finally returned him to his senses.

"Now…" Glorfindel struggled for a moment to remember. "Now I need the kingsfoil, for this is a poison wound."

He worked quickly, with sure fingers, and as he worked he sang ancient songs of power. But even as he worked, the poison crept towards her heart.

"Call her, Gimlîth. Call her by name. She is fighting, no surprise, but she needs to know which direction to fight towards."

The proud lady of the Haven dropped to her knees beside her daughter and in a voice steady and clear and commanding as ever he had heard it, she summoned the girl by a name that sounded fairer to Glorfindel's ear than ever he had heard.

"Azruarî, come back. It is time to come back."

Glorfindel wove the name into his songs, singing quietly into her ear as though telling her many secrets. He was encouraged only by the strong grip she maintained upon Echiar, which she would not have wrested from her, and by the furrow in her brow. For three nights he knelt by her side singing his songs of healing, and felt in her pulse and breath how she fought the battle against the venom that sought to claim her heart. Gimlîth, too, stayed in the room with them, dozing only for minutes at a time and otherwise kneeling beside Glorfindel and calling her daughter.

Finally, on the third day, just as the dawn sent first light through the window, Azruarî's eyes snapped open and she looked around feverishly.

"The sea," she rasped in a voice withered from disuse. "She calls me to the sea." And so saying, she attempted wrestle her way out of bed, wincing from excruciating pain but undeterred.

"Wait, Azruarî," Glorfindel murmured, catching her carefully in his hands. Her heartbeat was swift and mad, like a trapped hummingbird's. "If you must go to the sea, let me carry you. For I cannot allow the poison to spread to the rest of your body."

Even half-lucid, the girl appeared to see the sense of this, for she laid back and allowed him to scoop her into his arms. With Gimlîth following silently, he carried the child to the shores several miles outside Pelargir, where the rivers met the sea. There, Azruarî kissed her mother's hand and bid her wait upon the sand. Then Glorfindel waded into the water and held the feverish girl to his chest protectively as the cold tides rushed to meet them, submerging him up to his waist. He looked hesitantly down at the girl, suddenly unsure if he could surrender her to the vast and terrible ocean that surrounded them on all sides, stretching out endlessly into the west. But she smiled at him, and her eyes were fathomless and encompassing, and he knew that the matter was no longer in his power. Gingerly, he released her so that she floated upon the waves like a delicate ship. The brine passed over her body like loving hands, unfolding her white cotton clothes and caressing the wound beside her heart. At first she cried out in pain at the cleansing sting and he rushed forward and tried to gather her to his chest, but she would not suffer herself to be removed. Then he heard an unearthly voice, deep and melancholy as the forces of the earth, echoing in the waves, singing a lullaby of unbearable beauty. Azruari's furrowed brow was smoothed, and for the first time he saw tranquility settle upon her young face.

"So, my friend, still you find some room in your little body for secrets," he whispered to his companion, who now lay still and serene, floating in the saltwater. "Uinen is indeed a worthy guardian for a spirit such as yours."

Her fingers had now loosened enough for him to gently remove the dagger from her hand and tuck it into his belt. Then he thanked the Maia fervently, and the wind swept his words away and over the sea. He lifted the girl again into his arms and they returned to shore.

* * *

Now at last Azruarî slept in peace for a while, not knowing that three figures gathered night and day about her bed. At last her fever broke, and she awoke that day cheerful and ravening to find Glorfindel, Bereneth, and her mother staring down at her.

"Oh, hello!" she exclaimed, slightly disconcerted by their intense gazes. "Is there any food to be had? Some mushrooms would be preferred, of course, but a nice meat stew would not go amiss either."

That was the first time in many years that Azruarî saw her mother cry, for upon hearing this request, she crumpled like paper onto the bed beside her and soaked the startled girl's shoulder in tears.

"Mother, forgive me! If there is no stew, bread will do nicely!"

"Foolish child! Wicked sylph! What madness drove you to open combat with a man twice your size?" her mother sobbed out, shuddering between words. "You have no right-no right at all-to die before I do."

Azruarî stroked her mother's back gently, murmuring bewildered apologies. She looked pleadingly at Glorfindel and Bereneth and mimed an eating motion. Glorfindel, torn apparently between his own frustration and amusement nodded and beckoned to Bereneth to follow him.

* * *

Out in the hall, Glorfindel allowed some of his own emotion to surface temporarily as he passed a hand before his eyes and blinked back a few tears of relief and long-suspended grief. Then he turned to Bereneth, who was shaking as she leaned heavily against the wall. He rested a hand firmly on her shoulder to steady her.

"Come, Bereneth, I think we could all do with a solid meal."

They walked together in silence until they reached The Capsized Duck, an inn in the city center. The keeper appeared to know why they had come, for he silently handed them a large quantity of food-including fine mushroom soup-and waved away the money Bereneth offered.

"Anything for Lady Gimlîth and young master Gimilzagar, milord," he said. "Though I would be grateful for some news of the boy, for I have grown fond of his mad ways and that silly red bandana."

Glorfindel and Bereneth exchanged a glance uncertain of what to say. For indeed, it was clear to them that Gimilzagar of the Red Bandanna was no more.

"We shall return when we know more, my friend. Thank you kindly for this-it shall not be forgotten."

On their way back, Glorfindel broke their shared silence.

"Did you know?" he asked the quiet girl. "About Azruarî?" he added unnecessarily.

"Only since the eve of the assault on Minas Mornosp," she replied, her eyes fixed gravely upon the road ahead. "She told me herself. She sought to dissuade me from following into danger. I told her that I would follow the one I loved wheresoever they may go. She hoped to release me from that love so that I might abandon the danger ahead."

"But she couldn't," Glorfindel prompted gently, feeling immense compassion for the brave, quiet girl.

"I don't know why she thought it would make a damned bit of difference," Bereneth whispered, her eyes filling with tears. "Why she would think that my love could be shaken so easily as that."

He laid a hand gently on the girl's trembling shoulder, and she looked up at him gratefully.

"Your heart is bold and true, Bereneth Amathiel, and it will lead you to joy someday."

Bereneth smiled sadly and looked towards the building where the object of her affections lay recuperating in blissful ignorance.

"Perhaps," she replied. "But for the moment, I fear it will lead me to ruin."

Both were correct.

* * *

When Azruarî had eaten a solid meal, she proved again impossible to restrain to a bed or even to a room. After devouring the mushroom soup, she begged a clean shirt and a pair of trousers so that she might walk through the city again. Gimlîth appeared to struggle with herself for several long minutes before she succumbed to Glorfindel's gentle suggestion that fresh air may do the girl good. She sent for some of Gimilzagar's clothes, and they all trooped out of the room as Azruarî donned them quickly.

But when she emerged, freshly clad in a white linen shirt, dark blue trousers, and a red sash, holding Echiar and Aegros in her hands, it was clear to all of them that no longer could she hide as Gimilzagar. In bearing and physique she was greatly changed, and indeed Glorfindel wondered how he had ever mistaken her for a boy.

_Then again, she is very persuasive._

"There you are, My Lord," Azruarî said with the same quick smile he had come to know so well. She handed him the twin blades with a theatrical bow. "My deepest apologies-for I return them a little the worse for wear."

He received them with a bow of equal grandeur.

"Nothing that a touch of the flame cannot fix. But I do not believe that I have had the pleasure of your acquaintance."

"Indeed!" she exclaimed. "Forgive my familiarity; my mother says it is my greatest failing-"

"_One _of your failings. Your _greatest_ failing is your flagrant flouting of all laws of self-preservation," interjected Gimlîth in a grumble.

The girl kissed her scowling mother on the cheek with a sweet smile.

"I'm alive, aren't I? I call that capital preservation of my self," she said with a flourish.

"That is due entirely to the intervention of your much wiser friends, as you well know," her mother retorted, apparently unable to restrain herself from engaging the roguish prodding of her young elf.

"I _do _choose my friends rather well. Indeed, I think I am to be congratulated."

Gimlîth raked a hand through her dark hair, speechless at her daughter's endless reserve of good humor. But through her frustration, Glorfindel saw the profound relief that her daughter had returned to her, seemingly as light-hearted and irretrievably wild as ever.

"I have duties to attend to," she said finally. "Go about your mischief, then, you incorrigible fiend. But hear me, girl: if you climb that tower again, I shall shoot you down myself."

"I do not doubt it, My Lady," Azruarî said solemnly. Then she smiled again and embraced her mother tightly. "I love you dearly, you know."

"And I you, little fool." And with that, the dark lady strode quickly away, and the spindrift girl turned back to Glorfindel, her hand pressed unconsciously to the point where the poison blade had pierced her.

"And now, My Lord, I believe I owe you an introduction."

* * *

"My my, we really are fools." When Glorfindel finished explaining the events of the last week to Cestedir, the homely elf shook his head and eyed the lissome half-elven child in disbelief as she walked arm in arm with Bereneth across the city square. "Well, you know what this means, of course."

Glorfindel raised a brow in an unspoken question. Cestedir heaved a deep sigh.

"I knew that pretty glowing hair of yours would cook your brain eventually. Why, it means we've found the Lady Galadriel's spindrift elven girl! Indeed, she fits the description a little _too _well-mad as sea birds and changing forms as quickly as the foam. At least we can be assured that the journey home will not be dull."

Though he knew immediately that Cestedir spoke the truth, Glorfindel's heart was troubled, though he could not discern why.

"If it is she we were sent to seek-"

"Is there really any question in your mind?"

"_If _it is she," he continued determinedly, "and we must bring her to Lothlorien… how do you propose to persuade her to leave Pelargir? She has devoted herself to defense of this city. Her chosen people are the Elendili of Numenor, not the elves of Galadriel's court. She would be even more lonely there than she is here, a plaything of the wise and powerful."

"I am not surprised, my friend, by your reservations. For though in battle you have the talons of an eagle, your heart is tender indeed. But in this case it betrays you; we have no choice but to bring her along, willing or no. Already I have heard rumor spreading on the roads of the child sorcerer who conquered Minas Mornosp. Much admiration and rejoicing there is, yes, but interlaced with suspicion and dread. That illusion of the phantom army was quite the impressive little stunt. Add to these rumors of witchcraft that Azruarî is now revealed to be female, and it is only a matter of time before hysteria sets in, kindled and fanned into flame by the King's Men of Umbar, of course."

Glorfindel's blood ran cold. As usual, the captain of the Galadhrim was talking sense, and he could no longer justify staying in this beautiful, beleaguered city by the sea.

"She will not go easily," he cautioned, watching as the girl bantered and gossiped with the keeper of the Capsized Duck.

"No," sighed Cestedir, "I don't suppose she will. But she will go, in the end. For even if she wouldn't act to preserve her own life, there is one who would risk anything, walk into exile a thousand times, if it meant protecting that girl."

As if on cue, Gimlîth strode purposefully into the city square and swiftly into the nameless tower, presumably on some business with the Counsel of Generals. Now Glorfindel's heart weighed heavy in earnest, for though Azruarî might some day find a home among the elves, he knew that her mother never would.

_2577 SA_

When Glorfindel and Cestedir made their case to Gimlîth, she heard their arguments in her customary pensive silence, her eyes burning holes in each of them in turn as she evaluated them. Finally, they had exhausted all their carefully prepared words, and sat before her in silence for a time while she leaned back behind her great oaken desk, which was situated in a building adjoining a watchtower at the city wall.

"I have heard similar rumors," she said at last, her voice calm and steady, though Glorfindel fancied her could hear a heaviness in it. "That she is a sorceress, that she serves dark spirits of the sea… And already mutterings have begun to reach Pelargir itself. Mutterings that she is the heir to the Witch-King himself."

"Then she must be removed from here, My Lady," urged Glorfindel. "She must be taken somewhere to train her powers, to learn discipline and discretion. Otherwise her enemies will hound her to her death."

"Removed… and delivered to your Great Lady of the Wood, yes? To be manipulated, shaped, prepared for her part in the struggle and caged by some uncertain fate?"

"My lady, you have no reason to believe me, but I swear to you that I will never permit your daughter to be shackled by any being of the Earth. I will protect her freedom by any means necessary, and do it gladly," at this, Cestedir started in surprise and looked at his fellow captain in alarm. But Glorfindel was not to be dissuaded, and continued speaking. "I know that for her, imprisonment, even by the most benevolent hand, would mean death. I would not recommend this exile if I saw any other way. But your daughter has made powerful enemies now, and she will need powerful friends if she is to live out the year."

Gimlîth leaned forward over the desk and her iron gaze gripped him in a vice.

"Do not take that oath lightly, Glorfindel. For she will not make it easy, and you may find great torment in allowing her to walk free through this world."

He did not yet know how true her words would prove, but he had a sensation of fingers brushing down his spine-a sign of premonition.

"I shall take it nevertheless, My Lady, and consider it an honor," he persisted, meeting her eyes firmly. After a moment, Gimlîth's face softened almost imperceptibly, and she inclined her head.

"Then I shall prepare our affairs. We shall be ready to depart by nightfall tomorrow. Myself and any of the elf children who care to join us."

"So quickly, milady?" Cestedir asked in surprise. "There is no need for such urgency."

"Better quick and clean. If we are to go, there is little sense in delays for sentimentality. Now, if you will excuse me, I must make arrangements."

And with that, she left her office with an air of finality.

* * *

_The next day, nearing dawn_

When Glorfindel rose, he looked up almost reflexively at the nameless tower of the haven. In the clear morning air, he could just make out a small figure perched at the edge, looking out towards the sea. Quietly, he slipped through the tower doors and into a large, beautiful hall of stone. When he had finally climbed the seemingly unending staircase and emerged onto the tower landing, Azruari had not moved at all. Only her eyes roved, wandering the city and the shore ravenously.

"Isn't it beautiful, Glorfindel?"

He joined her at the edge and looked out upon the sea.

"Indeed it is, My Lady."

She started and shot him a sidelong smile.

"Well that won't do at all. I won't have you going formal on me now."

"My apologies. Henceforth, I shall only address you as a lady when you behave like one."

"Then you shall be waiting a rather long time."

"Perhaps." They stood in silence together awhile, watching the iridescence of the dawn on the water concede slowly to the bright golden morning. Then the girl sighed and turned away. "You will miss it terribly, won't you?" he said, watching sadness fall upon her young face like a veil.

"I did not expect to. When we first arrived I felt so strange and stifled. But there is kindness here, and warmth. And the smell of the sea. They speak my native tongue and here and there I can find traces of my home. I fear it shall be a long time ere I hear the songs of Numenor again. But do not worry for me, dear friend-I always miss what I leave behind."

"Then let me give you something to help you look forward, for in the land of the Sinda, you shall need a Sindarin name."

Azruari smiled broadly, but perhaps a little sadly.

"A new part to play! You certainly know how to distract me from melancholy, Glorfindel."

"Then I name you Aearis,* for your Adunaic name, and Gwingien,* for you were crafted from the sea foam. May it bring you strength far from home. Come, take back your daggers now, Aearis Gwingien. For it is clear to me now that they belong rightfully to you." And so saying, he knelt before her and fastened Echiar and Aegros once again about her hips. "Tell your true name to no one, save those you trust entirely. For there is great power in a name, and you never know who may call out to you."

She studied him silently, with a shrewd gaze uncannily like her mother's.

"What danger do you fear, Glorfindel? You do not speak of it, but I see a shadow in your thoughts to which you will give no name."

"I cannot yet account for it," he said truthfully. "But I feel that somewhere, something walks this earth that will haunt your steps and urge you ever forward even when you wish to be still."

She shivered, for into his sweet voice had come a deep echo, as though another spoke through him from a great distance.

"Thank you, Glorfindel," she said, shaking from his faraway trance by grasping his hands in hers. He returned instantly, and his eyes snapped into focus upon hers.

"What for?" he asked.

"Why, for many things. Mostly, I suppose, for your honesty. I know you are pulled by many forces, and that I cannot be allowed to see them all. But I know you to be a true friend to me, and I shall not forget that. So here," she took the red bandana that he had returned to her upon her awakening and tied it again about his belt, "I name you my champion in this strange new land you are guiding me to."

"I am honored," said the elf lord, bowing his head low to her, "My Lady."

* * *

_Nightfall_

The company of Glorfindel and Cestedir left Pelargir with five more riders than they had arrived with. Gimlith, Azruari, and Bereneth accompanied them, and so too did two of the other orphans, twin boys of 60 years old who now reverted to their Sindarin names, Lachon and Nendir Cirion, sailor's sons who had washed ashore after a terrible shipwreck. But Tamruzîr the smith remained behind, for he had no family left among the elves of Middle Earth, and found himself more at ease among the jolly blacksmiths of Pelargir than he ever had in the elven realms.

"Oh, don't fret so, Lady Gimlith," he urged with a broad grin. "I survived here for a while before you arrived, and so shall I continue now. Besides," he added wickedly, "someone must remain here to send word if we have need of the sea-witch's services once again."

Lady Gimlith grumbled, but Azruari smiled-rather more flattered, Glorfindel thought, by the title of "sea-witch" than she strictly ought to be-and kissed the top of his head from her position on the back of Glorfindel's tall white horse.

The new additions rather slowed the party, for Lachon and Nendir had not ridden much on horseback, and even Lady Gimlith's large, mighty black stallion, Daeroch, could not easily keep pace with elven mounts in cross-country gallops. The five hundred miles that the elven party had covered in a single day and night, even through the mountain passes, now took them several days as they stopped for food, slowed to trot and rest Daeroch and the horses who bore multiple riders. However, the party was merrier now, and the soldiers laughed and sang with the young elves. Even Gimlith graced them with a song or two from Numenor, in a surprisingly lovely voice, rough and sweet as a kitten's tongue, expressive and tuneful. Bereneth's voice ran low and soothing, like the rustling of a thousand willow leaves. And Azruari's… it was not a voice that Glorfindel expected of a child. In it he heard the song of the shells upon the shore, the rush and rage of the waves, and the melancholy call of the Ulumuri* themselves. He heard, as if recalling a distant dream, the voices of the Falmari raised in rapture of the sea, and the pity of Uinen, and the raging of Osse.

So unnerved was he, to hear a voice of Alqualonde come from a daughter of Numenor, that one night he drew Gimlith aside and asked the question that had been burning his tongue, though he had promised himself not to ask it.

"Who is her father, Gimlith? Does he yet live? For only in the far West, in the city of the Teleri, have I heard such voices before."

"We do not speak much of him," she replied, with a faraway look in her dark eyes, "for he brought great pain with him, and left even more behind."

"Forgive me, My Lady. I should not pry." She shrugged and waved away his apology.

"It is a natural question. He was of the Teleri, yes. As beautiful of body as of voice. We call him The Singer, for his voice was his greatest gift to Azruari. She sings many songs that I do not recognize, but I know they must be from him."

"Does he still live?"

"As far as I know, yes. He returned to the West after a time," she said matter-of-factly. If there was grief or anger in her voice, it had long been smoothed and eroded by the passage of time, and now she spoke as calmly as if he had asked her for her opinion on the wine.

Glorfindel thought of the laughing elven girl, crowned in her halo of wild dark curls, and the fierce dark lady who protected her with such passion and ferocity, and wondered that anyone could elect to leave such a family.

"Do not think too unkindly of him, Glorfindel," she added, smiling sadly at his unspoken indignation. "He loved me dearly for a while. Dearly enough to reject his own customs and forsake his sheltered shore. But he could not bear to watch me die and to ponder our eternal parting. The grief ate away at him, diminished him. And in the end all he _could_ do was to sail away to lands undying, and try to forget."

She returned to the fireside as the next song started, but Glorfindel lingered further away from the rest of the party for a while, lost in thought.

* * *

_Lothlorien_

They arrived finally at the woods of Lothlorien on midmorning of the fourth day. This was the first time that Glorfindel had the privilege of seeing Azruari truly nervous. She fidgeted with the edges of her white shirt and ineffectively ran a hand through her hair to smooth it.

The forest was deep and quiet, and the golden sunlight that filtered through the trees seemed thick and tangible, almost heavy as it fell upon their skin. Glorfindel listened for the distant singing of the elves, but all was silent as many pairs of invisible eyes fell upon the newcomers.

They walked slowly and cautiously, and Glorfindel's unease increased steadily as they advanced, still with no greeting or escort appearing from the leaves. If he had not known better, he might have thought the forest entirely empty. Just as he began to consider the possibility that some terrible evil had befallen Lothlorien, Bereneth dismounted suddenly from the back of Cestedir's horse and called out into the wood.

"I hear you there whispering! I see the stirrings in the leaves that no breeze has caused! Show yourselves, for this indeed is poor hospitality." Her voice was strong and clear, and the elven soldiers looked upon the habitually quiet girl with surprise and admiration.

For a moment, all was silent. Then, descending from the canopies upon lustrous silver ropes, four guards of the Galadhrim dropped gracefully to the forest floor, facing the returning party. They wore smiles of welcome and spoke fair words of greeting, bowing deeply, but their eyes were cold and guarded, especially when they fell upon Gimlith

"We would speak to the Lady Galadriel now," Glorfindel said, in a voice as clear and commanding as he could muster. "For our companions are weary from the long journey."

The guards tensed, hackles raised by the orders of a foreign elf lord. But Cestedir spurred his horse forward and repeated the order in his hoarse, calm voice, and the elves of the watch bowed again and bid them follow. At length, the riders of Glorfindel's company found themselves finally entering familiar clearings and perceiving hints of the hidden houses in the trees. Then the series of little groves and long paths lined with silver-bark trees opened suddenly into a large clearing dappled in filtered green sunlight. And there stood waiting a lady so fair and bright that she seemed to fill the forest with her radiance.

"Welcome, travelers," she said, opening her arms out to them. The riders dismounted as one and bowed deeply to the lady of the wood. "I am so very pleased that you are come at last." But her words rang hollow to Glorfindel's ears, for her eyes were fixed upon his, and he could sense her displeasure resonating as a rebuke in the back of his mind. "Please," she continued aloud, addressing the rest of the party, "follow my people and you shall eat and drink as much as your hearts desire and rest upon kingly bowers!"

After receiving a reassuring nod from Glorfindel, Gimlith reluctantly followed the guards with the children in tow, casting many looks behind her and overhead as she walked. Only Glorfindel and Cestedir stayed behind, commanded by some unspoken word.

"My word, you have been busy," said Galadriel, when they were alone. "I asked you for one elven child, and you have brought me four! And a mortal woman! Truly, Lord Glorfindel, your generosity is… quite excessive."

"Indeed, My Lady," he replied, baited into near insolence by the implied reproach, "when I arrived at Pelargir, I found myself struggling to determine which specific urchin you would prefer. So I thought I ought to simply bring you the whole mountain, as it were, so that you might pick the flower you liked best."

Beside him, Cestedir made a strangled choking sound-either he was suppressing a chuckle, or that he had swallowed his own tongue in horror of his friend's impertinence.

"You think me heartless, to object to the entrance of strangers into these lands. Perhaps. It would not be the first time I have been called so. But I am not in the business of taking in strays. I have a realm to protect, and with each newcomer comes risk."

"With all due respect, My Lady, these children have languished long in Pelargir with no help or succour from us. They are not of the race of Men, nor the kin of any who lived there, and yet they were welcomed and nurtured with open arms by people with far fewer advantages than we have here." This time it was Cestedir, with his disarming artlessness, who spoke. "We could not leave them."

"And the woman? What explanation can you offer for bringing a mortal warrior into our realm, Captain Cestedir?" Galadriel's voice was sharp now, and Glorfindel sensed that their shared defiance of her displeasure had awakened a more formidable anger in her.

"At your request, we have brought you the spindrift child, Aearis Gwingien of Pelargir. We would have been foolish indeed to attempt to separate her from her mother. For the Lady of Andunie will protect her daughter while breath remains in her body, and there is no force in Arda that will break their bond."

"You mean to say that you believe that the girl I sent you for is of mortal blood? You would have me accept into my tutelage a fatherless child of Numenor, where the Valar are rejected and elves are turned away from the shores of the king?"

"We have done what you asked, milady. Whether you accept her or not, that is the girl you sent us to retrieve," Cestedir replied staunchly.

"The minds of mortal Men are corruptible and petty, and any virtue they achieve during their lives is lost upon their deaths. I will not entrust my arts to any such creature. You were wrong to bring her here, and I shall not long suffer her and her mother to linger in my halls."

Galadriel's face changed, and through its soft, brilliant beauty the two elves saw the stirrings of great storms. But Glorfindel found that now his blood ran hot and his spine strengthened in the defense of his young charge.

"That _creature _as you call her has already shown more valor in her short life than most elves in your realm have displayed in all their time on Middle Earth. She would make a worthy pupil, and if you drive her from your halls without knowing her, you will deprive yourself of an extraordinary opportunity. Do not permit your pride and fear to blind you so."

As he spoke he seemed to grow brighter, and his voice echoed through the clearing like a thunderstorm. Galadriel stood impassive and unshaken by the anger of the elf lord, but something in his words appeared to reach her, for after a long, tense silence she spoke slowly, coldly, and deliberately.

"Your passion does you credit, Lord Glorfindel, but never again shall I tolerate such disrespect from you in my halls. I shall give the half-elven girl a fair hearing before passing any judgment, and they shall be sheltered here as long as you vouch for them."

Glorfindel inclined his head abruptly with a few terse words of appreciation and strode out of the clearing before he found himself moved to any more disrespect.

* * *

That night, in one of the greatest halls of Lothlorien, a great feast was prepared and laid out. Succulently roasted boar, sweet, ripe fruit, the heady nectar of rare flowers, and, by Glorfindel's specific instruction, a dish of fragrant mushrooms and cheese were set before the guests, as well as various of the most beautiful and wittiest elven lords and ladies of Galadriel's retinue. The traveling party, even Gimlith, found themselves disarmed by the charms of the court of Lothlorien, as they found themselves suddenly treated like important dignitaries rather than unwelcome stray cats.

Azruari was especially in her element, lovely and effervescent in the simple white dress she had been loaned for the occasion. Unlike the nobles of the court, there were no braids or ribbons in her dark hair, which tumbled in wild curls about her face. Beside her, her mother, wore an equally simple dress of dark, lustrous gray, with her hair twisted into a knot at the nape of her neck. In the light of the hall, dressed simply and elegantly, many years seemed to drop from the careworn woman's face, and she sat proud and beautiful as a Numenorean queen. While Aearis Gwingien, as she introduced herself with some panache and a strong Numenorean accent, bantered and laughed with the elven nobles, Gimlith watched them calmly and quietly, volunteering only an occasional witticism or observation in perfect Sindarin that appeared to earn her some regard from her reluctant hosts. They sat in positions of high honor,Aearis to Galadriel's right and Gimlith to Celeborn's left.

Galadriel watched quietly for most of the festivities, evaluating both mother and daughter with a cold but gracious smile. Celeborn, by contrast, conversed at length with Gimlith, whom he found exceptionally well-informed in world military affairs, and shockingly insightful concerning matters of strategy and tactics. Finally, as the meal drew to a close with a dessert of delicate blossoms delicately crystallized in sugar and nested in a light, airy cake that appeared to have the consistency more of a sweet fragrance than any solid food, Galadriel stood and raised a glass to the guests.

"To unlikely friends and fascinating strangers! I hope that we may soon learn far more of each other." As she spoke, her eyes alighted, as if by chance, upon Azruari's. From his position at the middle of the long table, he thought he saw the girl's spine stiffen and a shadow pass over her young face. "I have heard," she continued, after the polite applause died down. "That we have amongst us a singer of extraordinary talent. It would please me greatly, Aearis Gwingien, if you would honor us with a song or two."

The girl, startled and suddenly self-conscious, stammered a rapid excuse.

"Oh, come now, my dear, there can be no cause for embarrassment here! You are among friends!"

Glorfindel saw that the girl clearly felt the weight of the evaluation to which she was being subjected, and the loneliness of her sudden spotlight. He leapt to his feet and called for a lute.

"Come, my little friend," in as gay and untroubled a voice as he could fake, "sing that lovely little mariner's lay that you sang yesterday, and I shall endeavor to accompany you!"

With the lute of silvery wood and inlays of some iridescent stone that he was given, he hastened to stand behind Echel. With his presence at her back, she seemed to recover her courage and her voice, and her song swelled joyfully through the silent hall.

Galadriel's eyes did not leave Echel as she sang, but the girl took no notice, for her eyes were closed in rapture.

Many other songs followed, and the lords and ladies of Lothlorien appeared most eager to teach the songs of the realm to the girl with the voice like waves, and they called her Aearis the Singer. At this new moniker he saw Gimlith give a little start, but she quickly recovered her composure.

For a time after Aearis's song ended, Galadriel sat quite still, caught in some faraway thoughts as the revelry continued. Then she beckoned to Glorfindel and took him aside.

"Congratulations, Lord Glorfindel, you have managed to surprise me," she said, and her usual note of amusement had returned to her voice. "The songs that child sings belong to Uinen herself."

"She is a creature of many surprises, my lady. Give her half a chance, and she will do so again."

"Tell me, who is her father? For she sings with the voice of the high Teleri of the far West."

"I do not know, and nor do I care to. She exists, and she bears the grace of the Maiar of the sea. Is that not enough to make her worthy of your patronage?"

"Indeed, it would be more than enough. But she is a child with a mortal mother and no trace of her elven father. If I were to guess, I believe that she will choose one day to be counted among the Newcomers, and to vanish from the world forever. I will not teach my arts to a mortal, who will then pass from this world and leave us all behind forever."

And finally, Glorfindel saw past the pride and arrogance of Galadriel's reaction to the half-elven girl, into the heart of her fear. And he pitied her for a moment, for the true cause of her misgivings came from a source much deeper than mere bigotry. He remembered the loss, still so bitterly mourned, of Luthien Tinuviel, the loveliest and best of them, who had passed from the world in silence and left her family and friends to mourn her. He felt in Galadriel the echoes of grief long held and the fear of that absolute, utter mystery of the death of Men.

Gently, feeling suddenly full of compassion for the great lady of Lothlorien, he laid a hand for a moment upon her arm.

"That choice is still far ahead of her, and none of us can know what it will be. But in the meanwhile, she is fierce and strong and merry, and as your apprentice she shall bring you honor and joy. As for the safety of your realm, my lady, if there is anything that I have learned of her over the mere fortnight I have known her, it is that she will protect her home and her friends with all her cunning and abilities."

"You make a compelling case, Lord Glorfindel. I shall offer her a place in my court-" she raised a finger to preempt his next question- "along with her mother and the orphan children, yes. To the best of my ability, I will guide her in her studies. And you, in turn, must trust me to guide her rightly, and refrain from jumping in with a lute every time she falters. For you will not always be able to protect her, nor should you."

Glorfindel bowed and left, feeling both joy and misgiving at the prospect of this powerful apprenticeship. For though Azruari's spirit was strong and stubborn, and her abilities in desperate need of a proper teacher, he dreaded to see her become one of the refined nobles of the court of Lothlorien and disappear into Galadriel's sparkling flock.

He returned to the great hall as the festivities finally began to die down, and Azruari-Aearis, he corrected himself-separated herself from her new friends to run to him.

"Glorfindel! Have you heard? We are to remain here awhile."

"My congratulations," he said with a bright smile, ruffling her short hair from his seat at the table. "That is an honor indeed."

"Is it? I simply cannot tell amongst all these smiling, elegant people. Why, if they were planning to eat me tomorrow I don't think I would know it." He chuckled, a little relieved that she was not entirely swept away in the grandeur of the court.

"No, little one, indeed you might not know it until you were already crystallized in sugar."

"Then we shall need you now more than ever, my dear champion. I know you meant to depart Lothlorien soon and return to your realm, but couldn't you stay awhile? At least until I learn to keep my feet here?"

"My Lady, I am your champion, and I would not dream of leaving your side until by your will you release me."

She smiled and stood upon the tips of her toes to kiss his cheek before bidding him good night and leaving with her mother to find their quarters. For the first time, he felt the weight of his oath to Gimlith. That night he wandered far into the forest and found a little bubbling stream that sprung up from the stones and laughed and sang of far-off seas. Then he spoke into it, and hoped that somewhere, kind ears were listening.

"She is far from you now, but Azruari, daughter of the sea foam, needs you still."

The spring gave no answer save its gentle chuckle, and that night Glorfindel slept beside the little stream, allowing its murmured song to soothe his troubled mind.

**Translations:**

Uinen: a Maia who serves Ulmo, the Lady of the Sea. Protector of those who live by the sea.  
Ulumuri: the white conch shells of Ulmo-those who hear the song of the Ulumuri long forever for the sea.  
Aearis: "Sea queen" in Sindarin  
Gwingien: "Daughter of the spindrift" in Sindarin


	5. The Daughter of Love

**_"De qué otra forma se puede amenazar que no sea de muerte? Lo interesante, lo original, sería que alguien lo amenace a uno con la inmortalidad."_**

**"How else can one threaten, other than with death? The interesting, the original thing, would be to threaten someone with immortality."**

**-Jorge Luis Borges**

In her first weeks in Lothlorien, Azruari found herself swept along upon a wave of glittering feasts-always well-stocked with exquisite mushroom dishes, to her delight-and long hours in the halls of the minstrels.

At first, she continued to favor the clothes she wore in Pelargir-practical trousers, white cotton shirts, and colorful sashes with the sturdy black leather boots that had served her along the cobblestone roads of the city. But in this foreign elven realm, her old clothes suddenly seemed terribly loud and crude. She was painfully aware of every rustle of the rough cotton and the heaviness of her boots. Jewel-bright colors, she noted, were rarely seen in the attire of Lothlorien, for all were dressed in whispering silks in the colors of the earth, so that they could move unseen through greenery and bark of the towering trees. In order to evade prying eyes in the realms of Men, Azruari had only had to murmur sweet words to the shadows until they stretched out to embrace her, but here the shadows seemed shy and receding, and the eyes of the elves were keen and not inclined to be fooled by her tricks.

Yet she felt some strange resistance at the idea of adopting the lovely raiments of Lothlorien, as though she were looking down upon a narrow and fragile bridge across a great and terrible gulf-a bridge that may very well crumble to ash once crossed.

Her days were busy indeed, for the Lady Galadriel appeared to have chosen Azruari-or, as she had come to be called in the forest realm, Aearis-as a sort of pupil, and insisted on her attendance in court for many hours of the day. In the other hours, her favorite hours, she found herself buried in books of lore and song from the Elder Days, filled with abstruse interweavings of myth and fact, metaphor and method. When she settled in some shaded alcove with one of these volumes, she was momentarily at peace as her heart was swept along with the beauty of the stories and poems, and her fingers traced the illuminated script idly. Some of the books, especially those of modest binding and illustration, even seemed to sing with their own voices, and as she read she felt her skin tingling and sensitive, laying her open and exposed to the magic that burned through the world. Many hours she passed curled up in a quiet niche of the forest, drinking in tales she only half understood, but which seemed to linger in her memory as if she herself had lived them.

Even more curiously, when she read the songs of old, songs of power that sprang from the Earth itself, unfamiliar melodies rang through her mind unbidden, so she often found herself singing softly as she read. And so she devoured the books she was given, revelling both in the lore and the solitude. When Lady Galadriel would return from some mysterious business of the court and ask after her studies, Aearis would sing the old songs with the mysterious melodies the books had taught her, accompanied by no instrument except the sighs and murmurs of the forest while the great lady listened in silence. Sometimes, when Aearis would venture to ask questions concerning a point in the lore that she could not understand, the lady would smile enigmatically, but never would she answer.

One day, about a fortnight into her stay in the woods, Aearis was thus occupied with her solitary reading, when she heard the approach of a chorus of crystal-bright ladies' voices. She pleaded with the shadows to cloak her from interruption, but the shadows begged her pardon courteously and retreated even further from her comfortable bed of reeds.

So Aearis had no choice but to remain in place as the group of ladies emerged into the quiet clearing, laughing gaily.

"Why what is this!" cried one of the elf-maids, an extraordinary beauty with hair of pale, shining gold and eyes as blue as cornflowers. "I have never seen a corsair boy who reads ancient lore!"

Aearis suppressed the urge to fiddle self-consciously with her sash and trousers, and instead leapt up and bowed deeply to the party of ladies.

"Indeed, milady," she replied, exaggerating her Numenorian accent to comical levels, "I had hoped that the book might have some recipes or at least pictures, but in fact all it contains are words, words, words…"

The golden haired maid smiled and shook her head and curtseyed politely.

"I hope I do not offend you, little one, by my jest," she said more earnestly. "Much is said of the scholarly talent of the Lady Galadriel's new ward, eccentric wardrobe notwithstanding. I am Ninglorel Lalornien, and I welcome you and your friends to this court."

Aearis smiled and took her proffered hand.

"Not at all, Lady Ninglorel, I am coming to realize that these garments will not serve me as well in the woods as they did in Pelargir."

One of the other ladies snorted and eyed her coolly. This lady was even lovelier than the first, but her light was cold and distant as the stars, and Aearis recognized her as Gladien Lúthil, who often lingered about when Glorfindel was near.

"It would take more than a simple change of garment, I think, for this urchin to fit into the realm of Lorien. Indeed, I deem it impossible by the art of any member of this court or any other."

Ninglorel shot Lúthil a swift look of dislike, but just as swiftly she smiled sweetly and linked arms with Aearis and pulled her into the group. The slender blonde elf positively towered over Aearis, and seemed to bathe her in an aura of protective golden light.

"I will gladly take that wager, Lúthil. I am certain that the Lady Celebrian will be more than happy to assist in furnishing her mother's _guest of honor _with gowns worthy of any lady of the court. With a little guidance I suspect that she could pass for a lady in waiting for Lady Celebrian herself. After we tend to her hair, of course." Aearis's golden-haired defender delicately tucked one dark curl behind her charge's ear and smiled down at her, but her eyes were appraising. With chagrin, Aearis recognized that she had quite suddenly become contested territory in a war that had long raged between these two elegant ladies, likely longer than she had been alive. "Come, my dear," said Ninglorel imperiously, and Aearis found herself borne along with the elegant party.

These were the Lady Celebrian's handmaidens, she learned-nine ladies of distinguished beauty, wit, and skill selected from all the denizens of Lothlorien to make up a retinue of particular magnificence.

Among them, golden-haired Ninglorel quickly distinguished herself as the leader in charm and wisdom. As a girl she had traveled widely and read voraciously, and by her extensive knowledge in the old lore, she frequently aided Aearis in her studies. In exchange, Aearis regaled her with tales of Numenor in the West, of the brave mariners and political intrigues of Andustar. United in their enthusiasm for tales of seafaring adventure, Ninglorel and Aearis became a much-admired duet. They wrote prolifically of wild romances among the sailors to the south, and Ninglorel's clear songbird's voice harmonized beautifully with the sweet, dark tone of Aearis's.

By Ninglorel's influence, Aearis was quickly absorbed into the ranks of Celebrian's handmaidens.

They appeared to take great interest in the strange half-elven pupil of the Lady Galadriel, and especially the nature of her connection with Lord Glorfindel, whom Aearis came to understand was greatly admired among the ladies of Lothlorien.

When she walked with them, they bombarded her with questions about the elven lord-whether it was true that he had adopted her as his ward, whether he had ever spoken to her of the dragons and balrogs of Gondolin, whether she knew if he was courting a lady of another realm (apparently he had deftly eluded any such ensnarement in Lothlorien, even by the deftest and subtlest attempts of the eligible maidens of the court). She gathered-more from significant glances and cryptic insinuations-that even Lady Celebrian herself had tried and failed to secure his courtship many years ago, but that he had remained pleasing, yet unattainable for anything save passing dalliances for almost a millennium. At this, Aearis was indeed slightly taken aback, for from her observations Lady Celebrian was not only more exquisitely beautiful than any woman Aearis had ever beheld, but she was of exceedingly sweet disposition and sharp mind. Aearis found herself wondering that any male, elf or Man, could long resist her.

"If all this is true," she remarked one day to the ladies, "I cannot help but admire the perseverance of the ladies of the court. Surely no single prize can be worth such an effort. Yes, Glorfindel is a handsome fellow indeed, and quite jolly when he's not too serious, but surely there are others here of beautiful countenance and jovial disposition."

The ladies exchanged shocked glances, as though Aearis had casually asked why such a fuss had been made about the Silmarils themselves (a question she might also have asked, had it come up).

"Why my dear," cried Aeglossel, a dark-haired maiden whom Aearis had always thought rather silly, "Lord Glorfindel is far more than… well I can't even begin to… suffice it to say that in addition to his countenance and… joviality, as you put it, Lord Glorfindel is the greatest warrior who still walks upon Middle Earth. He is among the first born of our race, and his first years were spent in the light of the Trees of Valinor, and it is said that he lingers here in this dimming realm as the ambassador of the Valar themselves. The lady who wins his love will be a maiden of extraordinary purity and beauty, a paragon of the virtues of the Eldar."

This, indeed, was new information for the girl. Accustomed as she was to the elf lord, she had come to think of him in rather less grandiose terms. He seemed to keep counsel, when he could, with honest Cestedir and his plain-spoken soldiers, and to be thoroughly in his element among the mortals of Pelargir. She struggled to reconcile the vision of the great and terrible warrior of the Valar with the cheerful elf who swapped crude jokes with the troops and rough-housed with the children, but who seemed irritable and uncomfortable with the pomp and circumstance of the court.

And yet these words would remain ever echoing through her mind for many years to come, and from that day Azruari felt a gulf open between herself and the elf that she had jokingly-and quite impertinently, she realized now-named her champion. For now she realized that he was as far above her as the stars themselves, and that he belonged to the distant West that she had only ever glimpsed from the decks of the most daring of the ships of Numenor.

Nevertheless, she found great benefit in the friendship of Ninglorel and the curiosity of the other maidens, for they took it upon themselves to civilize the wild urchin-to dress her in the soft, cool, lustrous fabrics of the elves in all the latest fashions, and to attempt to tame her curls into elaborate, becoming braids.

The fashion in Lothlorien in those years, she learned, was in draping subtly shining silks in loose, flowing silhouettes, fixing them only with jewel-studded silver belts over the hips. Sleeves were large, and long, and-to Aearis's philistine eye-rather impractical. Her hair was deemed far too short, and she was instructed to grow it out so that it could accommodate the woven plaits that were strictly required to be a lady of fashion. However, to the endless frustration of the ladies, even once the girl's heavy hair had grown out to her waist, the curls could not be induced to smooth themselves into becoming ripples, and instead fell in playful dark cataracts and loose ringlets.

Lady Celebrian herself took an active hand in designing a wardrobe for Aearis, for it became increasingly clear as the girl grew that the prevalent fashions of the realm, which greatly flattered the tall, willowy maidens of Lorien, would not long suit the girl's burgeoning figure. Though she appeared to display little inclination to grow much taller, her breasts and hips developed quickly to proportions generally considered rather tawdry in elven aesthetics. She was deemed rather too swarthy, and her thick arching brows, full lips, and freckles were similarly lamented as regrettable evidence of her mortal blood, difficult to conceal even by the most skilled of Celebrian's retinue. Only her eyes, with their shifting oceanic colors and thick curling lashes, were celebrated for their beauty, and much admired in the court.

Finally, after many hours of draping and tutting, it was declared that modifications must be made to present Aearis to her best advantage, and Celebrian and Ninglorel applied themselves to developing a set of acceptable adaptations of historical styles. They took great pains to include in their designs the flowing simplicity of Lothlorien's fashion, but at Aearis's tentative suggestion they considered also the style in Numenor, where sleeves were fixed at the wrist to permit easy use of her hands, and many of the women who sailed as mariners were inclined to wear trousers.

And so they settled finally upon a wardrobe of comfortable, crisp, fluttering tunics in fabrics of hues that shifted with the colors of the light, over leggings of light, durable hide for everyday wear. For the many feasts and functions at which dancing was required, however, they furnished her with a large selection of beautifully tailored dresses, woven of silk finer than any she had ever seen or touched. In silhouette they were simple-the gathered sleeves leaving her shoulders bared in the Lothlorien style, a simple bodice tracing her waist as if by some hidden intelligence of the fabric itself, then loose, lightweight skirts flaring around her hips. Though at first glance, every dress appeared the same ivory color, iridescent threads woven into the cloth shimmered under the light and shifted colors as she moved. Subtle, beaded embroidery glimmered at the hems like seafoam, in patterns of the swirls of tides and eddies.

With her hair they declared an uneasy peace. During the day, she braided it coarsely into a single dark crown around her head, allowing the most stubborn tendrils to escape and tickle her temples and the nape of her neck. This style appeared to please the Lady Galadriel in particular, though why Aearis could not say. At feasts and events of the court, the ladies of the retinue had to satisfy themselves with a few small, simple plaits from her temples, gathered back and fastened at the back of her head with a shining comb of gold and pearl that bore the image of several swanlike ships upon a turbulent sea. The rest of her hair they gilded with a few small, glinting ornaments and otherwise left to tumble in its loose spirals down her back. But overall, Celebrian's ladies declared themselves quite satisfied with their labors, for their young charge emerged from their ministrations quite fetching, albeit unconventional. In stillness she did not have quite the divine refinement of the nobles of Lorien, but her feet were light and her spirits were high, and when she danced beneath in the green clearings of the forest, the tempests of iridescent light and curling darkness brought a wild, heady joy to those who beheld her.

Celebrian found herself especially pleased, for at the first ball where the half-elven child appeared in her improved form, Glorfindel bowed deeply to kiss the hand of the blushing lady and heartily congratulate her upon her efforts.

"My lady, you have outdone yourself," he murmured in her ear as they watched the twirling girl dancing hand in hand with Bereneth, who looked lovely in the more conventional draping white raiments of the court. "Although I believe she has already lost both of the slippers she came in with."

"No matter," said Celebrian, her tone nonchalant, though her heart fluttered into her throat when his lips came so close to her ear, "I shall find some ribbons to tie them on next time."

"A wise decision-I believe both shoes caused some consternation as they flew into the crowd and impacted the heads of dignitaries of some repute." Celebrian winced and looked up at her companion in sudden alarm, shaken from the golden hypnosis of his company for a moment. But he was chuckling and merry, and it was impossible to worry in such company. "Do not concern yourself too much, my lady. The little rogue can muster the prettiest apologies I've ever seen-they were practically thanking her for the privilege of the bruises by the time she finished with them."

Indeed, between her singing and the aesthetic improvements of the ladies of Celebrian, Aearis soon became a much-celebrated, if unconventional gem of the court. She learned the songs of the minstrels of the court and taught them in her turn the music of Numenor, playful and gay, but always carrying in it a strange note of of profound sadness that appealed to the Lorien elves.

As her popularity grew in the court, her critics found themselves struggling to find a foothold. Whispers of her parentage were circulated, that she was born the unwanted bastard of some lesser elf, who had quickly abandoned her mother after a night of unbridled lust. But such was the dignity and nobility of character of the Lady Gimlith, and so cheerful was the disposition of the young singer, that the rumors soon lost their power. The name-which Ninglorel, fuming, suspected Luthil of coining-that was meant as a cruel allusion to this scandalous affair, came to be used as an endearment. Aearis Melethien, they called her, the daughter of Love.

Even her speech, which still bore the accent of the Numenor, was declared charming and exotic once she learned to suppress it to a subtle, enigmatic hint of origins far away over the sea. The girl's mother, now a favored advisor of Lord Celeborn and often present at strategy meetings with King Amdir himself, was rumored to be descended from the line of Elros himself. The elves of the court came to agree that, as daughters of Men went, Gimlith was clearly of superior bloodline, and slowly she was accepted as an elegant and valiant daughter of kings.

* * *

Thus almost seven years passed, and Glorfindel watched as the court of Lorien spun its crystalline magic around Azruari, the wild climbing thorn, and adorned her with their jewel-bright blossoms, and even a new name. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, her face seemed to change, her skin grew ever more luminous, her childish freckles seemed to fade, and her motions took on some of the courtly delicacy she learned from Ninglorel and Celebrian. Though he rejoiced in the blossoming of her confidence, and in the many songs and stories that she sang for him in a voice that seemed loaded with ancient emotion, in his heart he felt some heaviness for the softening of her fire. With every month, he saw less of Azruari Half-Elven of Numenor, and more of Aearis of Lorien, Lady Galadriel's personal minstrel.

More troubling still, as the years passed, her behavior towards him shifted slowly from the cheerful irreverence that he had cursed so happily. Some tales of his deeds appeared to have reached her tender ears, and slowly her jokes at his expense came less frequently, and she rarely sought his counsel. He sensed propriety descend like a dense curtain between them, and he mourned the loss of his wild little friend as she curtseyed to him from across the grand halls.

But still, she seemed happy, and the other elf orphans had taken to Lothlorien with ease. Bereneth spent her days in earnest study of the ways of crafting and using the fine longbows of the wood, and was soon offered an apprenticeship with the Galadhrim Guard. Lachon found himself falling in love at least once a week with each of the ladies of the court in turn, and thus became an accomplished singer in his many attempts to woo the objects of his affection. His brother, Nendir, found great joy in the birds and beasts of the wood, and his talent with the horses of the realm brought him great regard among the soldiers.

And so Glorfindel waited, and watched, and tried to ignore the unease that paced always at the back of his mind.

* * *

_Fall Equinox, 2811 SA _

On the eve of the festival of the Autumn Equinox, as Aearis dressed herself in a light, floating dress of the color of the harvest moon, Ninglorel brought her a summons to the chambers of Lady Galadriel herself. Fair Ninglorel, in a rare state of nerves, tugged and adjusted Aearis's clothes, lacing ribbons about her feet to bind her slippers on securely, and vainly smoothing the curls around her face.

Despite her unspoken apprenticeship to the great lady, Aearis was rarely invited to Galadriel's personal quarters, and then only to sing a song or two when her teacher found herself kept from sleep. She followed Ninglorel in uncharacteristic silence, her mind clamoring with speculation, her stomach clenched, her fingers nervously toying with the embroidery on her skirt.

The great doors swung open and closed behind her silently, but Aearis felt it keenly as they shut, separating her from her friends and protectors as if by thousands of miles. The Lady of the Wood stood at the center of the spare, beautiful room in a raiment of glimmering white that draped over her fair skin like moonlight, and her luminous hair fell down her back unbraided, unadorned, exquisitely pure.

Aearis curtseyed deeply, and Lady Galadriel acknowledged with her customary gracious, unfathomable smile. Then, for a time, they both stood perfectly still, studying each other. Finally, the lady settled into a chair of simple craftsmanship and bid the girl sit opposite her.

"So, my little singer, you have now passed six winters in this wood. I believe it is time for us to understand each other better…" she trailed off, and if she had not been the great Lady Galadriel of the Golden Wood, Aearis might have suspected that she felt a bit awkward. "So," she resumed, "are you… enjoying your studies?"

"Very much, my lady," Aearis replied truthfully. "Your library is magnificent-I have never known its equal, even in the castle of Andunie itself."

"And do you find your skills in the songs of power much advanced?" At this, Aearis hesitated, torn between honesty and diplomacy. "Speak freely, child," the lady urged.

"I have learned many ancient enchantments, and I believe I have learned much of the magic of this world," she replied carefully. "But with the passing of the seasons, I feel ever more distant from the blood of the earth. I can see the power that courses through the wind and the trees more clearly, but I cannot touch it. As if… as if I live in a cage of crystal. The shadows will not speak to me here save for passing pleasantries, and the words of the streams and rivers are sweet and complacent. We pass as friendly strangers."

The lady listened in silence, her gaze fixed attentively upon Aearis's face. When she offered no response, Aearis continued. Her frustration, her midnight pacing, her unanswered songs overcame her in a flood of sudden honesty.

"It was not so in Andustar, nor in Pelargir. Oh, the world was recalcitrant, to be sure. Dealings with the shadows could be treacherous, their promises of shelter sometimes reluctantly given and suddenly broken, the truths in their whispers were interlaced with riddles and little fibs. And the waves were proud and uncouth, endlessly opinionated. But at least they could be reasoned with, and they liked a good argument. Here, though the forest brims with life and power, my voice is… diminished."

"You are accustomed to lands, Aearis, where the elements answer only to themselves. There, your wildness, your caprice, may be enough to charm the impetuous powers of the earth into fleeting, unreliable alliances. But do not mistake indulgence with deference."

"I do not seek deference from the sea or the wind, only to walk a while with them as good company."

"I can show you how to become far more than that, you know. I can show you how to spin enchanted realms where the fire of the Earth serves your command, where the soil blossoms at your word and the waters sing the songs you ask of them. In this wood, all that blooms and breathes and moves answers to my will, and I know all that passes from the songs of the leaves and the streams."

"That is a mighty throne indeed," murmured Aearis, dropping her eyes from Galadriel's in sudden discomfort. "And how did you come to such a position? For the woods are strong and proud, and I do not imagine that they would readily bend to the will of another."

"In return, I protect the sanctity of this land from the shadows that roam Middle Earth. I preserve its beauty and bring order to the chaos. While I reside here, the water shall run pure and time shall pass over the land like a distant cloud. The lands grant me dominion, and in return I bind my fate to them."

Aearis sat quietly, mulling over Galadriel's words. She attempted to sit absolutely still, but her breath was caught in her throat and she felt a tightness of panic in her stomach. Finally, she could contain herself no longer.

"With all due respect, milady," she replied, hoping that her voice was steady and calm, "I do not relish the thought of achieving such control, any more than I could surrender my freedom in exchange."

Galadriel raised a brow and examined her with more interest.

"So you do not wish to possess, nor to be possessed… That is difficult indeed in this world. Then tell me, Aearis, what do you know of love?"

The question took her by surprise, and drew forth an answer before she could pause to consider it.

"Why I suppose fear it more than anything, my lady," she replied, and as she said it she knew it to be true. "Love is a cage that one cannot bear to escape. Love is a cruelty, both to giver and receiver."

"What of your mother's love of you?"

"My mother has suffered for love all of her life, my lady. Of all the brutal foes that my mother has fought and conquered, the only one that has come close to killing her, time and time again, was love. She loved my father, and he loved her, and by that bond they nearly destroyed themselves. For her love of me, we wander this earth, ever further from the sea that is our home. And I love her too, and for this I live in fear of losing her, of bringing her into danger."

"And you? You have never been in love?"

"We are not in the habit of wedding for love in Numenor, My Lady. I was a minor noble in my land, raised in comfort and privilege. For that good fortune, a political match is a small burden indeed."

She fell silent suddenly, as though remembering something that she did not wish to escape her lips. Never had she spoken so long and so privately with her teacher, and she found herself disturbed by the ease with which the words flowed.

"But, I think, you have been loved," observed the lady, shrewdly.

"Yes, milady."

"And you did not love him in return?"

"He was a sweet boy, though very young. Soft-eyed and sentimental. We were great friends, and he would not have been a bad match, for his father sympathized with the elf-friends and held a considerable force of ships."

"And what became of this soft-eyed boy?" asked the lady, her gazing burning through the girl like a battering ram.

"I think…" Aearis dropped her eyes for a moment and blinked furiously before returning to meet Galadriel's gaze. "I think he died for me."

Then she was quiet again, awaiting the lady's next question.

"All of us live in chains of some kind or another, Aearis Melethien," said the lady. "And in vain shall you try to escape them. If you wish to learn the powers of the world and to summon them to your aid, you must accept that your fate is bound to theirs. You have no small gift in the ways of song and enchantment, and if you wish, I shall teach you. For a price."

"Name it, my Lady."

"I ask only that you sacrifice that which you hold dearest, though it is indeed only a phantom that you guard so jealously. Accept your bonds to the Earth. Renounce mortality and walk among the Firstborn as our kin, for our fates are tied to Ea, the fire at the heart of the world. Only then can I teach you what I know."

Aearis felt something wet on her palms and looked down-distantly, she noted that her knuckles were so tightly clenched that her nails had drawn blood from her palms.

"You do me great honor, My Lady, by your offer" she heard herself say. "But that choice is mine alone to make, and not lightly shall I barter it away."

"That choice is an illusion," retorted the lady, "for I can see as clearly as the stars that your soul is swept by the winds and seas, as though bound to the mast of a ship. You are not doomed to a mortal death."

"You speak with certainty," said the girl, speaking calmly around the cold anger in her veins. "Yet if my choice is so inevitable, why rush it? Why not indulge my indecision for a while, if indeed I am doomed to the path of the Firstborn?"

"You are my pupil, and I must guide you to your path," said Galadriel, in a voice of iron and adamant. "You are the daughter of the sea, and to the sea you owe your allegiance."

"Your guidance is gratefully received, my Lady. I thank you for your counsel, but, begging your pardon, I shall dally a while longer. The sea has never asked me to swear my fealty, and for that it has earned my deepest affection."

"Foolish, stubborn child! You will never achieve greatness while you tarry in indecision. Doubt will dog your footsteps and gnaw at your mind and heart, and your voice will vanish into oblivion." The lady had stood, and drawn herself up to her full height, towering above the seated girl like a furious cyclone menacing a fishing boat.

"Then I suppose," replied Aearis quietly, "I shall have to accept the mediocrity of freedom."

She faced the tempest with the cold clarity of a Numenorean mariner, and as she held the gaze of the great and terrible lady, the waves seemed to diminish until again they found themselves in the tranquil wooden room in the canopy of the golden wood, becalmed in mutual stubbornness.

"Come now, Aearis, my dear. Forgive me my temper, for it is born of affection." The lady's voice was suddenly sweet and her smile gracious. "I am certain that by the time of the festival of Winter Solstice, we shall understand each other better."

Aearis curtseyed and left the room, and soon she was adrift in the sparkling tides of dancing elves. But from that moment she was sundered from the charms of Lorien, and her heart wandered onward to lands unknown.

* * *

"Oh, my dear, mad friend. Each time I believe that I have discovered the full extent of your rashness, you surprise me again," sighed Bereneth, though in her voice there was far more resignation than shock. The two girls sat together in a tree branch deep in the forest, high enough to reach the pale autumn sun's cold light. Azruari's hands were buried in Bereneth's long auburn hair, weaving the strands into a net of interweaving ropes that recalled the mariner's knots of Numenor. She worked absent-mindedly as she recited as well as she could the events of her discussion with the Lady Galadriel.

"You think I acted wrongly?" she asked, tying another lustrous green ribbon into her arrangement. "I could not see any other path-I cannot imagine that even I could have lied to the Lady of the Golden Wood."

"Tact is not a lie, you know."

"Not at first. But it quickly begins to apologize for the truth. And the truth is that I am half-elven, and I was given the gift of choice. It is all I have in this land that is mine, and fiercely shall I protect it."

"It is _not _all you have here." Bereneth spoke so quietly that her voice almost faded into the sigh of the wind through the leaves. She turned her head to fix her clear gray gaze upon Azruari. "And if you heed nothing else from your encounter with Lady Galadriel, heed this: as long as you are loved, you will be bound in some way. And while you guard your precious choice, those who of us who are tied to your fate by our love of you shall always live in just a little bit of misery. I do not say this to hurry you in your decision, for indeed I do not believe you are yet ready to make it. I ask only that you surrender some of that righteous indignation, and make a little room in your heart for compassion."

To this, Azruari found herself without reply. She nodded silently, and leaned forward to place a chaste kiss on Bereneth's forehead, one of her hands still tangled deeply in her friend's thick hair. Then she resumed her work, and they spoke of lighter things.


	6. The Coming of Winter

"But when the strong were too weak to hurt the weak, the weak had to be strong enough to leave."

― Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being

_First Day of Winter, 2811 SA _

Gimlith left the counsel chambers with a splitting headache that had grown more and more familiar during her stay in Lothlorien. Out of the corner of her eye, she noted Lord Celeborn approaching with several scrolls.

_Will nothing sate his appetite for talking strategy? _

She breathed in deeply through her nose and turned to face him with what she hoped was a gracious smile.

"Lady Gimlith," he began eagerly, "I have taken the liberty of creating a schematic of your troop placement recommendations, would you-"

"Begging your pardon, milord, milady," a rough, familiar voice cut in just as Gimlith's headache mounted to a fever pitch, "I'm sorry to cut in, but the Lady Gimlith did promise to lunch with me today." Gimlith spun around to see Cestedir standing bashfully a few paces away. Celeborn stared at him absently for a few seconds, his mind plainly venturing back to troop movements.

"Ah!" he exclaimed, smiling. "Even better, dear fellow. Perhaps you might join us for a rousing discussion of surveillance methods!"

Gimlith felt her escape slipping away and acted instinctively, bounding over to take Cestedir's arm.

"I'm afraid it isn't _that _kind of lunch, my lord," she said, casting her best impression of a doe-eyed glance at the rough-hewn captain.

"Oh! Oh… I see…" the elven lord flushed deeply and his eyes darted between them, "Please, forgive me for intruding!" Then, apparently having exhausted his conversational limits, he wandered away to ambush Captain Berior, who noted his approach and attempted to busy himself with a nearby guard.

They disappeared as quickly as they could into the trees, and Cestedir produced a block of excellent cheese, a loaf of bread, and several varieties of cured meats from a sack. They sat with their backs to a giant oak.

"Thought you might need a break," he said with a grin as she bit hungrily into the cheese, ignoring the bread entirely. "Lord Celeborn always gets a little needy with his favorite military advisors, bless him."

"You were right. I was about to do something drastic."

They sat in silence for a while as Gimlith industriously devoured the cheese and meat, washing it down with generous gulps of the flask of fine elvish wine that Cestedir kept strapped to his belt. When she had finished, she closed her eyes and leaned back against the trunk, sighing contentedly. Cestedir watched her face with his heart in his throat, memorizing every contour of her fine face.

"I'm sorry, by the way. I'm sure there will be rumors about our secret tryst racing about the forest within the hour. I doubt that will be good for your reputation," she said, her eyes still closed.

"There already were," he replied carelessly, "I doubt this incident will make much difference. Besides," he continued, cautiously, "you know that I… well. You know."

She opened her eyes and raised a brow at him.

"Oh, not this again. Really, Cestedir, I thought you would have thought better of that by now."

"Then maybe," he replied, slightly galled in spite of himself, "you might consider the possibility that it's _not _an idle fancy and that I really do-"

"_ Don't _say it," she cut in, firmly.

"Fine. But not saying it won't make it any less true." He looked into her dark eyes, and perhaps by a trick of the light he thought he saw a brief smile flicker through them.

"We've been through this," she continued in a softer tone. "Even without all that bother about death and immortality, it would lay your career to waste if you were to take up with a mortal woman."

"I've heard your reasons. You're a brilliant woman, Gimlith, but you can't seem to grasp the simple fact that none of that means anything to me anymore. I know you'll die one day and go somewhere I can't follow. But until then I will live my life for you, whether you accept it or not."

Gimlith sighed and shook her head.

"Fine. Then how about some more cheese?"

Cestedir grinned and brought another wedge out of his sack.

"As you wish, my lady."

* * *

_2760 SA: Andúnië, Númenor _

Her name was no longer Narthanes-not for many years had she heard that name spoken. Indeed, not for many years had she resembled that girl that danced upon the shore, her feet kicking up the spindrifts that sailed in upon the waves. Now she was Mother, or Captain, or, more rarely, Beloved.

Glirron had not returned. Four days ago, he had left to hunt for herbs that would ease her pain, but now the sun set again and she wished more than anything for him to return.

Or, perhaps she didn't. She could no longer be sure. She rose from her seat by the window and climbed the steps to the child's room where her daughter slept peacefully. She studied the girl's small face, her luminous skin, her delicate leaf-shaped ears, the slight smile that curved her lips even in repose. Was it worth it? She asked herself this question every day, and her answers varied.

Beneath, she heard the opening of the door. So, he had returned. For now.

She breathed in deeply, arranged her face in a smile, and descended.

* * *

_Winter Solstice, 2811 SA _

She was dreaming of a silver ship when Azruari woke her. Her eyes snapped open immediately at the sound of her daughter's urgent tone and she sprang out of bed, heart racing.

"What's wrong? Are you alright? Are you hurt?"

"I'm fine, but we need to leave," Azruari spoke low and quick, and in the moonlight her face looked pale and strained. "I am no longer welcome here."

Gimlith nodded and began to pack a bag as with efficient, practiced hands. Clothes suited for the road, flint stones, spyglass, rope, and weapons.

"We will need food," she said, mostly to herself.

"That's taken care of. We'll have enough for three weeks if we ration. Bereneth has Daeroch is saddled and waiting for us."

Gimlith turned and looked at her daughter. Azruari looked much older than she remembered. For a moment she felt an overwhelming sadness. _Is this my legacy for her? A talent for running away? _

Then she shook herself and returned her attention to the present.

"There, that's done. Do you have road clothes?"

"I borrowed some of Nendir's riding clothes. They're too large for me in most areas and a bit too tight in a few others, but they will do."

Several questions sprang to Gimlith's mind, but she swallowed them.

They ventured out into the darkness with only their packs, descending from their small cabin onto the grassy roads that led through the trees. As they reached the edge of the city, Gimlith's eyes detected a golden glow, somehow both subtler and brighter than that of a torch.

_Glorfindel. _She braced herself for an argument and continued walking grimly forward. For a brief moment, her mind settled on Cestedir, and she wondered if she would see him again. _Come now, don't be maudlin. What does it matter if you see him again? _

The elf lord stood at the edge of town, holding the reins of his luminous white steed in one hand and a pack in the other. Bereneth stood beside him, guiding Daeroch.

"Bereneth, what-" Azruari started, but Bereneth shrugged and smiled.

"He wouldn't have it any other way. Something about 'a champion's duty.' You know how he is."

"Yes," said Glorfindel, "you do, so let's not waste time arguing about a decision I've already made. I have food and a good blade. I advise you to accept them."

Despite herself, Gimlith found herself reeling with relief. Wherever they were going, the road would be long and treacherous, and she could not deny that the elven lord had a rather reassuring presence.

"Fine," she said, "then let's be off." Glorfindel shook his head.

"Not just yet," he said. "We're still waiting for one more."

As if on cue, Gimlith heard a rustling behind her, and turned to see Cestedir leading his great bay horse from the stables. He was dressed for the road in nondescript steel armor, and carrying a pack apparently bursting with supplies. With him walked a lady so bright and so beautiful that the darkness of the night fled from her form.

"Sorry I'm late," Cestedir muttered as they approached. "Had to find some cheese."

Of all the quick succession of emotions that Gimlith had entertained that night, this one was by far the most staggering. Her heart leapt in her chest and tears sprang to her eyes before she could stop them. He gave her a crooked smile, and she wondered if he could see her embarrassing display in the dark.

"Lady Celebrian," Azruari breathed, dropping into a deep curtsey. But her shoulders tensed and Gimlith saw fear in her posture.

"Rise, Aearis," said the lady, her eyes sparkling, "for humility does not suit you." Celebrian gestured, and Nendir walked forward out of the shadows leading two fine gray horses. "I could not permit the hospitality of our house to be tarnished by allowing guests to leave unmarked and without gifts. To you, Aearis Gwingien, and you, Bereneth Amathiel, I present the horses Alphaear and Alassir. Treat them with kindness and they shall bear you far and well." She turned her bright eyes to Gimilith. "For you, my lady, I have chosen this cloak," she continued, shaking out the folds of a dark, colorless cloth that seemed to move of its own accord. She fastened the silver clasps about Gimlith's shoulders, and the fabric felt like cool water flowing over her skin. "May it shield you from unfriendly eyes."

Then, Celebrian turned to look at Glorfindel. Her eyes were so sad that Gimlith felt her own heart break.

"And for you, my lord, I could find no gift, for it was clear long ago that you want nothing that I can give to you." Her voice was laden with an ancient grief. Glorfindel's fair face fell, guilt plainly etched there. "So I offer you only a piece of advice: you have found now what you sought when I met you. Defend it."

He bowed deeply to her, murmuring his thanks. Then, Celebrian smiled over their party, a smile sweet and bright that seemed to light their way forward. And then she was gone, swallowed by the shadows of the trees. Gimlith waited for her silver form to fade, then turned on the newly arrived Captain of Lothlorien.

"Cestedir, are you mad?" she started, mostly to cover the deafening sound of her pounding heart. "You can't abandon your post just to-"

"Escort the woman I love to safety? Nonsense. As you can see, that's exactly what I'm doing. Anyway, it's not abandoning my post-that was Celebrian's gift to me."

"Mother, Cestedir, can we postpone this lover's quarrel for about two days? After that I'm sure we'll all be more than happy to listen in."

Gimlith hesitated for a moment, then turned to Glorfindel.

"Where to, O Champion?"

Glorfindel's face was set as he turned it towards the darkness.

"Westwards."

"Lead on."

And with that, they set off into the gloom: mother, daughter, and the people who loved them.

* * *

Of that journey from Lothlorien through the mines of Moria and finally to Imladris, home of Elrond Half-Elven, little has been written. Later in her life, Aearis Gwingien would tell the odd story of the hospitality of the dwarves, of their glittering lights and the thousand dancing shadows of the passage to the city of Dwarrowdelf.

Suffice it to say that the winter that Aearis and Bereneth spent in Moria was a happy one, and even the shadow of the Lady Galadriel's anger could not taint the wonder and excitement of the starry halls of Durin's Folk. Bereneth learned much of the crafting of fine weapons and armor from the dwarves, of the bright mithril mail and finely tempered swords that sang like unearthly voices as they cut through the air.

As for Aearis, many were the hours that she passed walking in silence through the cavernous halls of the dwarven city. Through passageways where no sound could be heard but the endless echoes of her own footsteps, she wandered with endless fascination. Great crystalline lamps, which appeared to her be suspended in midair, shed dancing white light over their path, so that their shadows flickered and moved with a life of their own. The light reflected chaotically over the smooth, glassy black walls, whose facets and carvings glimmered in the darkness. Space seemed to expand and contract around her, and she felt as though she walked in the firmament, far above the earth. When she sang out to the depths of the caverns, the shadows seemed to keep time with her, changing their erratic patterns to entwine with the rhythms of her songs. Sometimes she thought that the dancing darkness took forms that walked alongside her, just out of view, but when she focused her eyes they seemed to melt away shyly. After the strange indifference of the natural forces in Lothlorien, Aearis revelled in the capricious friendship of Moria's playful specters.

Merry and joyous were the nights they passed with the dwarves as they waited for winter to pass, and much loved were the songs that the elves brought to King Norin's halls. But the question of where they would go after the passing of winter weighed heavy on their minds, and Aearis overheard many whispered arguments between Glorfindel and Gimlith. Gimlith had listened to Aearis's hurried explanation of what had passed between herself and the Lady Galadriel with barely contained fury.

On the night that Galadriel had banished Aearis from Lorien, the girl found herself called once again to the lady's private quarters. There they had spoken lightly of unimportant things for a time, before Galadriel bid her follow to a dark clearing, where a basin of bright water stood illuminated by the starlight. There Aearis saw many things. She saw a lady with flowing dark hair, and skin glowing with the light of the stars. Before her evil things fell and melted away, fleeing from her blazing eyes. She saw a shining city built over the city, and a marble tower from which the dark lady looked out over her kingdom with perfect clarity. She saw dragons fall and cities crumble at her touch, ships wrecked by her songs. She saw Numenor, overshadowed by storm clouds that advanced from the east. She saw strange, shadowy figures swinging softly in groves of fragrant trees, Andunie in flames, bloody corpses on altars at the temple in the City of Kings. Then she saw the dark lady again: kneeling beside a grave, watching from afar as golden-flowered trees burned and crumbled on an island she had once loved. But to the dark lady, the dying island appeared as a distant dream, and no pain touched her as the screams of Numenor washed over her ears.

Many would be the times that Galadriel's words that night returned to haunt Aearis's mind.

"Look who you could become, if you allow yourself to rise above mortality. The kingdoms of men will rise and fall with the tides, but we shall be eternal, enduring. Our power will rush over the world like a cleansing flame, deathless and pure."

And she imagined it. Imagined living without fear. Imagined watching Numenor fall without grief. Imagined an eternal rise, until she stood so far above the world that she could not be touched.

And she ran.

* * *

"Imladris is the only option, Gimlith."

"I will not accept that. We'll find somewhere else."

"There _isn't _anywhere else!" Glorfindel's voice, usually mellifluous and joyful, seemed strained. "Not for her. Believe me, if there were any other way-"

"Any other way than placing my daughter in the way of another power-hungry elven lord? You were there, Glorfindel, you saw how the wisest of your kind treated her. I won't have her choice taken away from her. Not again."

"Elrond is nothing like Galadriel, my love," interjected Cestedir, who had been watching the exchange for some time. "He's half-elven too. He'll understand better than anyone."

Far from appearing reassured, Gimlith's frown grew deeper and she shook her head.

"How can you be sure that he'll have her best interests at heart? I can defend her from ruffians, from wild beasts, from the ignorance of Men, but how can I defend her from her own kind?"

"You can't," Glorfindel said, quietly and sadly. "You can only hope that you've raised her to be wild and stubborn enough that she can defend herself."

"And goodness knows, mother, we know you've done that." Aearis emerged from the shadows so suddenly that all three adults jumped to their feet and drew their weapons simultaneously.

"Azruari!" cried Gimlith, once she had recovered her composure. "How many times have we spoken to about eavesdropping?"

"Case in point," she replied, shrugging. "And I don't see why I should let the three of _you _sit around cozily discussing _my _fate. Or Bereneth's, for that matter."

The adults exchanged wary looks.

"Is she hiding somewhere around here as well?"

"Oh, no, she has better things to do. But I am authorized to negotiate for the both of us."

"I see this has turned into a formal diplomatic talk," muttered Cestedir, smiling wryly.

"Well we could hardly allow ourselves to be excluded from the proceedings," said Aearis with no hint of irony. She seated herself primly across the kitchen table from Glorfindel and gave him a piercing look so like her mother's that Glorfindel had to fight the impulse to shrink back from her steely gaze.

"So, you propose that we seek an audience with Elrond Half-Elven? Why not go to Lindon?"

"Lindon is a fair kingdom, and Gil-Galad is a wise king, but they are at war. If I were to take you there, I fear that you would quickly find yourself in the same position as you were in Lothlorien. Elrond and his brother both faced the choice of the Half-Elven, and you yourself are his distant kin. I would not bring you there if I did not think he would protect you."

"And what of Bereneth? Would she be welcome too?"

"I have never known Elrond to turn anyone from his halls. He is much in need of clever, resourceful young people, for many have left his realm to add their swords to Gil-Galad's armies."

"And my mother?" Her voice hardened as she asked this question, and Glorfindel felt the importance of his answer.

"As I said, I do not think Elrond would turn away anyone of good intentions, let alone a daughter of Numenor and a descendant of his own brother's line." She continued to look at him, her eyes searching. He held her gaze, seeking the source of her fear and reticence. Finally, he spoke again. "I have vowed to protect you, Azruari of Andunie. I will not leave your side until you have found safety, wherever that may be. If you believe nothing else, believe that I would never again guide you anywhere that your family, your life, or your freedom is under threat."

He fell silent, and the quiet stretched between them as she continued to search his face. Finally, she spoke in a voice strong and sure, full of purpose.

"I believe you." She turned to her Gimlith, who had watched the whole exchange with a carefully neutral expression. "We should go to Imladris, mother."

For once, every second of Gimlith's long and difficult life was etched upon her face, illuminated by the firelight.

She nodded silently, and turned her face towards the hearth. Cestedir reached out and grasped her hand in his, but it was cold as stone.

* * *

_2766 SA: Andúnië, Númenor _

When Azruari turned sixteen, a dream came to her parents. In the morning they awoke, neither remembering a single moment, but both sure of the message.

The woman who was once Narthanes met Glirron's gray gaze with tears in her eyes, and spoke the wonderful and terrible truth.

"She must choose," she said, and her voice was barely a whisper. Glirron closed his beautiful eyes and turned his face away from her, and the gulf between them seemed to expand to a vast ocean.

For a time after the dream, Glirron appeared happier than he had been for years. He doted on Azruari as he never had, and taught her songs of such haunting beauty that the great white birds that circled the coast of Andustar huddled in vast flocks beside their cottage to hear father and daughter sing the sweet, sad melodies of the Falmari.

All seemed well, almost perfect, until a cruel winter's morning. In her usual way, Azruari slipped out of the house early to swim out from the coast to perch on the smooth, tall rocks, where she could sometimes hear the music of distant horns from the West. The day passed with rain and storms, and as the hour grew later Azruari showed no sign of returning. Boats were sent out and returned with no news of the child, and Glirron's fear grew into a storm in his chest. And close behind followed anger. Anger at the sea, for calling him to this distant shore, for giving him love so consuming that the loss of it would render him hollow, for claiming the little dark-haired child whose voice echoed in his ears like an unwelcome ghost. Anger at the woman he loved, for her beauty, for her mortality, for the love that burned him like a brand. Anger at Azruari, for the freckles on her cheeks, for the Choice that lay ahead of her, for the restless spirit that called her ever outwards and away into perils unknown.

Not even when Azruari returned that night, soaking wet and puzzled by all the fuss-for she had swum out rather farther than usual, and stayed transfixed by the song of the storms-did Glirron's fear and fury subside. From that moment, every reminder of Azruari's mortal blood sent him into terrible rages. Even her name, in the tongue of her mother's people, stuck in his throat like broken glass. He left for weeks at a time to sail alone upon the storm-torn waves, returning unpredictably to ask the same question.

Azruari wept bitterly, for she could not settle the question that tormented her father's mind. She searched her heart for the answer, pleaded with the Valar to show her the path, but every time she sought guidance she found her mind more unsettled, less certain than before.

Azruari's mother watched her husband, first with sadness, then with anger, as his fear lay waste to her joyful daughter.

On the night of Azruari's seventeenth birthday, Glirron returned once more to the cottage by the sea, his eyes clouded and his hair wild.

"Where is the girl?" he snarled, when he saw his wife sitting alone beside the fire. He had not called his daughter by her name for months.

She did not answer, but rose from her chair and threw a hide pack at his feet. His eyes fixed uncomprehendingly on the object, wide and unfocused.

"There is a ship leaving tonight for Tol Eressea. This time you will be on it." The flat, cold tone of her voice surprised even her. He met her gaze, and she saw the flashes of emotion fighting behind his eyes.

"Who are you," he said, in a harsh voice so distant from that of the dashing minstrel who had courted a noble lady of Andustar, "to banish _me _?"

"I am Gimlith, Captain of the Marine Guard. I am Narthanes Silivressel, the lady you once loved. I am the mother of Azruari Half-Elven, the girl whose heart you have torn asunder with your fear and selfishness." She seemed to grow as she spoke until he quailed under her black gaze. Her voice resonated through the room with the power of a hurricane."And I am the woman who will kill you if you ever set foot on these shores again."

Azruari returned from her grandfather's halls that night to find her mother alone, reading peacefully by lamplight. The starlight streamed in through the window and lit her mother's tranquil face. Gimlith looked up and smiled as her daughter approached. Her face looked younger than Azruari had ever seen it.

"He's gone," said the girl. It was not a question. Gimlith nodded. "Because I couldn't answer his question? I drove him away, didn't I? If I had just Chosen, like he wanted me to-"

Gimlith held up a hand, and Azruari fell silent, tears falling down her cheeks.

"No. He is gone because we must be free, and he couldn't bear it." She caught her daughter's face in her hands and looked straight into her turbulent, doubtful eyes. "Hear me now, Azruari: one day, you will choose your path. No matter which way you decide, that choice will break your heart. I cannot conceal that from you, nor would I seek to."

"But if I had just-"

"But that heartbreak will be yours to choose, and it will be _right _," she continued. "Your father could not make that choice for you, and he was wrong to try."

"I wish I could have answered him."

"I know, my love."

Gimlith held her daughter all through that night until she ran out of tears.

The next day, the first rays of the golden summer sun warmed the island. Gimlith unlocked a long-forgotten drawer, pulled out a set of tarnished silver beads, and set to polishing them until they shone like stars. By the light of that night's fire, Azruari wove the glittering beads into her mother's dark hair, and beheld with astonishment the starlit, graceful lady who walked out to the shore and danced barefoot in the sand.

For that night, as she laughed and twirled in the brine, the dreaded question faded from her mind.

"Who shall you be, Azruari Half-Elven?"


	7. Rivendell

"With him, life was routine; without him, life was unbearable."

**― Harper Lee** **, To Kill a Mockingbird**

The two-day ride to Imladris passed rather too quickly for Azruari's taste. Though she had felt very sure that night by the fire, as they drew nearer to the hidden elven town she found her confidence waning. Ahead rode Glorfindel, bright as the dawn. Bereneth rode beside her, steady and good-humored. Bringing up the rear, Gimlith and Cestedir rode side by side, conversing quietly.

At dusk on the second day, as they rode along the singing river Bruinen, they came upon a ford. Glorfindel beckoned to them to cross into the dense trees beyond, keeping close to the foothills of the Misty mountains. Azruari found herself straining her eyes to see ahead, for though the air was clear and the evening bright, she could not see far ahead of her. They rode slowly now, following Glorfindel closely, for no road seemed to exist until he spurred his horse forward, and then the trees would give way and reveal the path.

Then, as the moon rose bright in the fading sky, its first light fell upon the hills, and suddenly there appeared pale buildings that caught the light like subtly shining gems. In the distance, built into a rushing waterfall, stood a tall, proud tower that bloomed like an exotic white flower in the silver light. There stood the house of Elrond Half-Elven, constructed from delicate arches so fine that they could have been woven from slender flowering vines.

"Welcome, friends," cried Glorfindel, his voice swelling with joy as they looked out over the luminous elven village, "to the Haven of Imladris."

He led them up the winding path to Elrond's house, where they dismounted. Elves in fine, deep-blue livery approached and bowed deeply to Glorfindel. If they questioned the presence of the mortal woman and the strange children, no sign of it appeared on their fine faces. Gimlith threw several looks back towards them as the led the horses away.

"Relax, my dear. The elves of Imladris know how to care for horses."

"I won't have them spoiling Daeroch," she grumbled, her eyes still fixed suspiciously on the backs of the unfamiliar elves. "He wouldn't eat anything except _flowers _after a month in Lothlorien."

As they crossed through a brightly illuminated courtyard, they found themselves greeted by an elf dressed in light, fluid white robes. He was tall and slender, with long hair as lustrous as water and dark as shadows. In his clear eyes Azruari saw starlight and wisdom, and in his face, both youthful and ancient, she found such serenity that she felt for a moment that her heart had stopped.

His gray gaze settled on her, and she thought she saw recognition in his discerning stare.

"Welcome," said he, and the sound washed over her like the tides of Andustar. Her heart began again, and now it thundered recklessly in her ears, " and well met."

To her dismay, she found her voice nowhere to be found, and merely lowered her eyes shyly. Glorfindel, however, strode forward and wrapped his arms around the dark-haired elf as if greeting a brother. Their joyful laughter rang through the mountains like music.

When they parted, Elrond approached the four remaining guests with a brilliant smile.

"What magic have you wrought now, Glorfindel, to bring two of my kinswomen to me after so many years of separation?" He clasped Gimlith's hands in his and looked deeply into her wide dark eyes. "Many centuries have passed since I saw my brother's countenance in another, my lady. But now I find him here in your eyes, far lovelier than ever he was when I knew him."

Gimlith looked rather taken aback, but disarmed, by the warmth of the stranger's greeting.

"My lord, I am Gimlith of Andunie," she said, after searching for words for a moment. "I have come from the city of Pelargir with my children to seek haven in your fair home."

Elrond turned his searching gaze once again upon the elven girls who stood behind Gimlith, their hands clasped together securely.

"I confess, I have heard tell of the elven children of Pelargir. Much is said of the bravery of Bereneth Amathiel, the solemn archer." So saying, he bowed deeply to Bereneth, who returned the gesture gracefully. "And of Aearis Gwingien I have heard many tales," he continued, and Azruari's knees nearly buckled under the weight of his bright eyes. "Too long has it been since I heard the songs of the Falmari. I hope you will grace my hall with your voice soon." She nodded dumbly, hoping that the power of speech would soon return to her.

To her relief, two more servants appeared from the shadows, and Elrond turned away from her.

"I have taken the liberty of arranging rooms for each of you in my own house. Once you have settled in you might join us, if you wish, in the Hall of Fire and regale us with your travels."

Time in Imladris passed over Azruari like a gentle tide. Days and weeks passed in the blink of an eye, marked only by the nights she spent spellbound in the Hall of Fire. There she was gently persuaded to pick up a lute and begin to join in tentatively with songs the elves of Imladris sang in bright, clear harmonies. Slowly she found her voice strengthened, even in the presence of the beautiful Half-Elf who presided over the festivities each night.

Finally, after several weeks of tireless practices with only Bereneth and Glorfindel as her audience, she dared one night to venture a song of her own. It was not one of the songs of the Teleri that her father had taught her, for she found that those left a rather bitter taste in her mouth. Instead she sang her own arrangement of a Numenorean mariner's lay, which spoke of a swan who descended one day to bathe in the springs in the forests of Andustar. Sheltered in the privacy of the evening, she shed her swan's feathers and revealed a beautiful young maiden to the night. A young sailor, walking home from the harbor, stumbled upon her in the moonlit clearing, and fell in love with her clear, sweet voice as she serenaded the wind. Then he raised his voice to join hers in song, and under the night sky they intertwined in passion.

The song had been written originally for a male voice singing praises and lament for the swan maiden whom he loved, and then lost. Azruari's Sindarin song, however, was written for the part of the swan maiden, who craved both freedom and captivity. Who loved the young sailor, but who was carried away by the same wind that bore her to him. She wove in Glorfindel's voice as the sailor's, and Bereneth's as the ever-faithful moon, and together they wove a three-part harmony that rose and plunged between ecstasy and devastation. Long and sad was the tragedy of Gwaerenel the Swan Maiden, and when the song ended silence descended upon the usually merry hall.

Lindir, a young minstrel who had arrived recently from the court of Gil-Galad, lowered his face into his hands and wept, and soon others followed until the room was filled with quietly sobbing elves. The blood drained from Azruari's face and she looked to Glorfindel in panic. He was surveying the room with what looked like great satisfaction, and he turned to her with a smile that warmed her skin like sunshine.

"Believe it or not," he whispered, "that was an excellent reception."

After the success of the Lay of Gwaerenel, Aeiris found herself rather overwhelmed by the demands for new songs. Elrond, after some discussion with Glorfindel and Cestedir, had offered her an apprenticeship in his Halls of Healing. She had managed to squeak out a flustered "yes," and thereafter her days were long and arduous.

Under the firm guidance of the healers of Elrond's court, she learned to refine herbs into potent elixirs, to stitch wounds, and to cut away necrotic flesh to prevent the spread of corruption. The power of her voice, too, she learned to channel so that the spirits of the ill and dying responded to her will and drove death from their heels. By the end of each day she emerged from the halls covered in blood, her hands dyed with all manner of plant essences, and sore of throat.

Every night, she performed songs translated from Adunaic for the audience of eager elves, who bombarded her with technical questions concerning Numenorean theories of music composition. But tired as she was, she never once missed an evening in the Hall of Fire, for these were the only times that she could be sure that she would see Glorfindel.

Since they had arrived, Glorfindel had been under constant demand. Often he rode out with the Imladris patrols, who protected the borders of the haven from incursions by marauding goblins. At other times, he disappeared for hours with Elrond into his study, often accompanied by Cestedir, Gimlith, and Elrond's closest military advisors. Beyond these frequent demands, Aearis knew not what kept him so occupied, but with her healing apprenticeship devouring her days and frantic song-compositions consuming her nights, she had little opportunity to investigate.

Even Bereneth became difficult to track down, for she had accepted training with the Imladris Guard, and combat lessons occupied most of her time. The quiet girl had fast risen in the esteem of her teachers, with her quick, steady hand and her sharp eye. On a rare day off of her medical training, Aearis had wandered over the the training yard, where she arrived just in time to see Bereneth sink four arrows one after another into the heart of a swinging target. As she watched her soft-spoken friend spar with the strapping elven boys, artfully evading and parrying their blows until their own balance betrayed them and sent them careening to the ground, Aearis wondered how she could ever have thought that Bereneth needed protecting. Her long auburn hair whipped around her in a long, simple plait as she moved fluidly and weightlessly, dancing between blows with perfect precision.

She applauded enthusiastically when Bereneth knocked down her third opponent, and the eyes of the trainees turned to her. Bereneth smiled and approached, mopping her brow with a rag. Her ill-fated opponent bounded to his feet as well and followed her.

"Enjoying yourself while the rest of us work for our supper?" Bereneth teased, glancing at Azruari's immaculate dress.

"Careful how you address me, soldier," she replied haughtily, "for mine shall be the hands that mend you when your warlike ways lead to trouble."

Bereneth rolled her eyes, then gestured to the boy who hovered behind her.

"Aearis, this is Feldir, son of Hadron. He's quite the admirer of your little drinking songs."

In all fairness, to call him a boy was perhaps no longer accurate. He stood at least half a head taller than Bereneth, with a barrel chest and a strong, square jaw. His face was open, honest, and pleasing, and his eyes were a clear, candid blue. He turned pale at Bereneth's introduction and shot her a scandalized stare.

"Drinking songs! Oh, Bereneth, how can you say such things? The songs you sing in the Hall of Fire every evening, my lady, are more beautiful than-"

"No, she's right, they _were _supposed to be drinking songs," Aearis interrupted, smiling sunnily at the flustered Feldir as he struggled for words. "I do wish everyone would stop crying over them."

Feldir flushed and murmured a shy apology as he glanced between them. Then he loped back to the other trainees, his face beet red with embarrassment. Bereneth watched him go with mild regret and bemusement mingled on her face.

"I don't know how you managed it in one sentence, Aearis, but I think you shattered his will permanently."

"I didn't mean to," Aearis protested. "It's not my fault you bring me such breakable things."

"He's been hinting delicately that he'd like to meet you since I started training," Bereneth said with a shrug. "I thought he'd at least planned something to say. Now, do you need something, or were you just looking for tawdry amusement?"

"Can it not be both? It so happens that what I need _is _tawdry amusement. May I stay and watch the bloodshed while you devastate these handsome young elves?"

"Normally I would be pleased to have an appreciative audience," said Bereneth. "But Glorfindel passed by here. He said he was looking for you."

Aearis could not conceal her surprise. Glorfindel's marked absence had begun to feel almost intentional, and she found herself happier than she had been in months to hear that her champion had not forgotten her entirely.

"Oh, don't be so soggy," laughed Bereneth. "What, did you think he'd forgotten us?"

"Well… yes, a bit," Aearis admitted self-consciously. "We never see him except in the Hall."

"You mean to say the the nosiest, most incorrigibly curious elf in Middle Earth hasn't bothered to find out where her champion has been spending all his time?" Bereneth demanded incredulously. "It's not like you to be shy."

"He's not my champion," Aearis muttered quietly.

"Well don't let him hear you saying that. I think it might irreparably destroy his sense of purpose. Now come on, let's go find your elven lord before you drown in your sudden-onset humility."

They found Glorfindel at last in the courtyard where they had first met Elrond. He looked rather untidy. His bright hair looked distinctly ruffled, and the palms and fingertips of his enormous hands were worn, the nails chipped.

"Ah! There you are!" he cried, leaping to his feet at the sight of the elven girls. "Come quickly-Cestedir is baiting Gimlith over as we speak."

Puzzled, Aearis followed Bereneth and Glorfindel as they made their way down the hillside where Elrond's hall towered over the town, beside the southeastern fork of Bruinen and in through the trees, until they wandered into a brilliant clearing pressed flush against the base of the Misty Mountains. Down the stone face, a gentle waterfall cascaded into a deep, clear crystalline pool that glittered gold in the afternoon sunlight. Wild flowers painted the clearing in jewel-bright colors and suffused the air with heady, honey-sweet perfumes. And there, built into the stone, a delicate cottage in the high-ceilinged, airy style of Numenorean architecture.

"What in the name of Yavanna…" Aearis turned to see her mother entering the clearing after Cestedir, eyes as wide and uncomprehending as her own. "Cestedir, what-"

"It was Glorfindel's idea," said the rough-hewn elf, pleased at his lady's rare state of shock. "I just lent some muscle and good company."

"We thought, if you were to stay here, you might like your own home," said the elf lord, turning to look anxiously at the three women. "It was meant to be a surprise for all _three _of you, but Bereneth hunted us down and tortured our secrets out of us."

"By which he means that I overheard them discussing the building plans in loud, drunken voices one night," Bereneth corrected gently.

"Just so," Glorfindel conceded. "Nevertheless, I believe that you will find the furnishings quite well suited to the refined sensibilities of a military counselor to the lord of the house, a burgeoning warrior of the Imladris Guard, and the blood-soaked songstress of the Hall of Fire."

Dumbstruck, Gimlith and Aearis followed Bereneth inside. The interior of the house seemed was illuminated by the sunlight that flooded through the great Northern window, and stairs spiraled upward to bright, cheerful rooms for each of the three women. Gimlith's housed a large, beautifully carved desk, with a large window that faced east, that she might rise with the sun. Bereneth's quarters, lined with bursting bookshelves, occupied the space above, and overlooked all of Imladris over the canopy of the trees. Aearis's room overlooked the waterfall and the shimmering pool beneath, and the sound of the water flooded through her window like a familiar lullaby.

"Glorfindel," she murmured, running her hand along the ornately carved wooden railings along the staircases, "this is too much. You can't just build us a house."

"It brought me more joy than any other task I could have undertaken here, little one." Something in his voice caught her attention. A note of sadness, or regret.

"You're leaving, aren't you?" she asked, though the answer was already clear in the furrow of his brow.

Glorfindel gave her a rueful smile and ruffled her dark hair.

"I'd hoped you wouldn't be quite so perceptive tonight. Yes, I must go. Not immediately," he added hurriedly, as sadness flickered in Aearis's eyes, "but my presence is required in Lindon, and King Gil-Galad grows impatient."

"Of course," said Bereneth, "we understand, Glorfindel. You have done more for us than I ever dreamed."

Aearis nodded in agreement, finding that words could not quite find their way past the lump in her throat.

"Well, then we had best celebrate now, then!" Gimlith's voice roused Aearis somewhat. "Aearis, my love, would you run and scavenge some sustenance from the kitchens? I would be very pleased with some of their aged cheese."

"I'll accompany her," said Glorfindel quickly. "I don't trust her to return with anything except mushrooms."

They walked slowly, soaking the afternoon sun into their skin and speaking of small things. With his usual skill, Glorfindel soon brought her to laughter with a rather elaborate description of the court politics of formal balls in the court of Lindon. Outside the kitchen door, Glorfindel stopped short, and his expression was suddenly serious.

"Azruari." She thrilled at the sound of her true name on his lips and the sudden searching gaze that he leveled at her. "If you need me to, I'll stay."

The words took her by surprise, and she reeled back. She saw in his solemn gaze that he spoke the truth, and for a moment she toyed with her selfish fancy. He would stay. All she had to do was ask. She tested the words in her mind, imagining a life where his warm light lit her way at every fork, guided her around every corner.

Then her mind wandered away and westwards, back and beyond the sea. She thought of resentment and fear, of mortality and the everlasting life of the Eldar. And, even in the bright sun of Imladris, she shivered. Then she met his eyes steadily with a bright, sunny smile.

"Don't be silly, Glorfindel. I am quite settled here, just as you promised. Your duty lies elsewhere."

He studied her face, and he did not appear fully convinced. But she held his gaze until he sighed and smiled sadly.

"You are right, of course. You fit here better than I could ever have hoped, and I know that Elrond will take better care of you than I could. But oh, I shall miss you, my wild climbing thorn."

"And I you, my damned fool."


	8. The Shieldmaiden

"The heart can think of no devotion

Greater than being shore to the ocean-

Holding the curve of one position,

Counting an endless repetition."

― Robert Frost

Of Captain Bereneth Amathiel many books of lore now sing with reverence and tragedy, for strong was her sword arm and true did her arrows fly in times of war. In the tales of ages past, she is a knight of terrible ferocity, riding through bloody fields, heedless of death and doom. But little is now spoken of the rest of her-that which was good rather than great. Nothing is told of her mercy, her fidelity, or her love.

Thrice would the faithful heart of Bereneth Amathiel break. The first break was quiet and unspoken, like a cry unheard in the night. The second was full of rage and hate, like a wildfire taking hold at the core of her. The third was ageless and unending, as though it had begun at the first syllable of time, and it lingered within her like a shard of glass until she drew her last breath.

* * *

_Imladris, 2845 SA _

In the years before she reached her majority, Bereneth had, through no fault of her own, amassed an army of suitors. To her chagrin, the tutting older ladies of the court, who had darkly predicted that her apprenticeship with the Imladris patrol would drive any decent marriage prospects, had been thoroughly mistaken. The eager young-and some not-entirely-young-supplicants inquired with ever more insistence after Bereneth. To her credit, Gimlith held off the tide with no small skill. With a combination of pretty excuses and dark, withering stares she succeeded in driving them back from the door until not even the boldest of Bereneth's beaux dared set foot in their clearing.

But Gimlith could not always be there.

Bereneth kept a studiously courteous, mildly interested expression as Gadron, a wealthy trapper, slowly and stutteringly recited a poem to her ethereal beauty.

"O Beweneth Amathiel,

Twee fwog of the distant wood…"

He was interrupted when Bereneth emitted a strange choking sound and clapped a hand over her mouth.

"Is something wong, my lady?" he asked, his pale eyes narrowing in concern. Less for her health, and more for the distinct impression that she was laughing at him.

"No," she assured him once she had smothered the mad sound that threatened to rise in her throat, "nothing at all. Would you please excuse me, sir? I have remembered an urgent errand that I promised to complete for the Lady Gimlith"

She left the threat unspoken. _And imagine what she will do if she finds you detaining me. _

It was a testament to the mortal woman's menacing reputation that Gadron backed away instantly at the mention of her name, muttering polite excuses as he went.

Bereneth turned grimly towards the healing halls. She had a bard to skin.

She found Aearis in the laboratory at the healing halls, bent over a bench where several varieties of seed pods had been carefully cut open, spilling their contents into small glass dishes full of what appeared to be caterpillars. Her eye was pressed against a system of carefully aligned magnifying lenses and she was examining a vivid blue caterpillar inching its way sluggishly along the tabletop.

Elrond was looking closely over her shoulder, and Bereneth could see even from the doorway that Aearis's cheeks were flushed from her mentor's closeness.

She cleared her throat. Elrond turned to look at her and pressed a finger to his lips, but Aearis remained raptly attentive to her task as she lowered a small scalpel blade and slit the poor creature open from head to tail in a single, quick line. Then she picked up a long, glass straw that tapered to a needle-thin point and pushed it into the stomach of the eviscerated creature, then placed the thicker end in her mouth and sucked delicately until a bright, viscous blue fluid was pulled into the chamber without quite reaching her lips. Deftly, she deposited the filled pipe in a small glass bottle, stoppered it with a cork, and handed it to Elrond for labeling. Then she plucked another caterpillar from one of the bowls of seeds and began anew. This time, the liquid inside the creature was a vivid, ugly green. The process was slow, and Bereneth was already irritated.

"Aearis," she said sharply from the doorway. Startled, the dark-haired apprentice appeared to breathe in slightly too forcefully, and the contents of the little glass pipe flew into her mouth. She gasped and spluttered, too shocked even to swear, as she was excessively prone to do, in her mother tongue. Elrond's eyes widened in mild panic and he rushed to pour her a glass of water.

"Rinse and spit," he told her gently, handing her a small silver bowl. "Do _not _swallow."

Aearis obeyed him meekly, cleaning out her mouth until the water ran clear instead of blue. Then she turned to level a reproachful look at Bereneth.

"What a rotten trick! That caterpillar produces an extremely concentrated essence of nightshade, you know. A fine thing it would be if it kills me." Guilt seized Bereneth for a moment, but then Aearis was smiling sunnily, plainly amused. "Oh, please do not look at me that way, dear friend. There was never any real danger."

"There certainly _was _," interjected Elrond, who was still as pale as bones. "Aearis, this new technique of yours is absolute madness. I cannot allow it."

Aearis scoffed.

"It would have been _fine _if you had just locked the door. Look at all the concentrated elixirs we have now!" She gestured proudly to the row of small glass bottles, each containing a glass pipe oozing thick liquid of different colors. "The wolf-lily extract should last us five years, easily."

"A few bottles of medication are not worth killing my apprentice," he replied tensely.

"Given that a single drop of that extract could save a life, I would say that, mathematically speaking, it is demonstrably worth it."

Elrond was looking increasingly distressed by the discussion, running an elegant hand through his increasingly disorderly hair and biting at the nails of the other. Bereneth seized her fey friend's arm.

"If she is not in any immediate need of medical treatment, I shall take her home and keep an eye on her for the rest of the day," she promised the distraught lord. "Training was canceled today, and I have grievances to discuss with her." Elrond looked relieved. He handed her a bottle of dark fluid.

"Watch her pupils and her pulse, and give her a drop of this antidote once every three hours. If she starts hallucinating, bring her back."

Bereneth wondered privately how she would distinguish the nightshade hallucinations from Aearis's typical level of detachment from reality. But Elrond seemed to be in no temper for jest, so she wrapped a firm arm around Aearis and steered her firmly towards the door.

The girl hissed and threw up a hand to cover her eyes as they emerged into the bright winter. The sky was clear, pale blue and sunlight glinted blindingly off the fresh snow. Bereneth scrutinized her friend, and saw that the pupils of her eyes had swelled to fill her irises entirely. Her eyes were wide and black as the void, and her cheeks were feverishly flushed.

Aearis shrank away from the light, back towards the healing halls.

"Too bright," she muttered, "too hot."

Bereneth sighed and laid a cool hand over Aearis's eyes. She whispered soothingly in her friend's ear until the girl seemed to settle into a docile state. Then she led her away, guiding her carefully around roots and stones. For once, Aearis acquiesced without complaint.

Gimlith was away with the patrols, and the house was quiet, cold, and dark. Bereneth made to kindle the fireplace in the sitting room and open the windows, but Aearis begged her not to. So they sat in the dark together, and Bereneth could not bring herself to confront the girl. Thus, for a time, there was silence.

Finally, Aearis, ever impatient, broached the topic.

"So, grievances, you say?" She fixed Bereneth with a curious, quizzical stare and tilted her head.

"It doesn't matter," said Bereneth quickly, waving her hand dismissively. "We can talk about it when you feel better." Aearis studied her face, and her eyes were huge and dark and devouring.

"I feel marvelous. Is this about the courtship poem I gave to Calardan? I know his recitation leaves something to be desired, but…"

"Calardan?" Bereneth was shaken out of her resolve to remain silent until Aearis had recovered. "You gave him a poem, too?"

Aearis winced.

"Oh. So not him. Pity… it was one of my finer efforts. I believe at one point I managed to compare you to a teapot."

Bereneth pinched the bridge of her nose, closed her eyes, and breathed deeply.

"How many of these cursed things have you written?" she asked in a steady, neutral voice.

Aearis thought about it for a moment, clearly tallying in her mind.

"Let me see… counting Calardan… six? Oh, no, I forgot about the Thororion twins. Eight."

Despite herself, Bereneth had to admire the sheer industry of the operation.

"_ Eight _poems?"

"It turns out I have quite a lot to say about you."

"Including comparing me to a tree frog."

Aearis snorted and grinned.

"Ah, so Gadwon finally worked up the nerve to talk to you, did he?" She mockingly imitated Gadron's speech, over-exaggerating his weak 'r.' "How much did he get thwough?"

"About two lines."

"Ah, what a waste. The second stanza consisted only of words starting with 'r.' Oh, don't scowl at me so," she said in response to Bereneth's reproving gaze. "I thought you would laugh."

"You toy with people too much, Aearis. Gadron may be pompous, but he is honest. There was no need to humiliate him."

Even in the dark room, she could see that Aearis looked rather put off. She was not accustomed to criticism, and even her crueler jokes tended to amuse and entertain her audience enough to pass for harmless japery. Reproach was unfamiliar to her. Bereneth thought perhaps she ought to try a different tack.

"And besides," she continued, as Aearis continued to bristle, "if my closest friend agrees to write courtship poems, it will only serve to encourage them."

Aearis remained slightly sulky, but she responded in a cheerful enough voice.

"I suspect that they will persist with or without my help-I thought I might as well make it moderately amusing for the both of us. And," she added, brightening, "do you not wish to see what we received in exchange for my efforts?"

Bereneth stiffened.

"You mean to tell me that you actually _sold _that claptrap?"

Aearis grinned, proud as a cat who had brought its master not one, not two, but _eight _eviscerated lizards.

"I was planning to wait until your ceremony of majority to present everything to you, but since it is now unsure if I will live till then, what with this poison you made me swallow… "

Bereneth rolled her eyes, but she still followed as Aearis bounded up the stairs to her room. She always followed.

She was torn between disapproval and amazement as she watched Aearis lay out her spoils. An exquisitely crafted necklace of silver, set with shimmering moonstone. A crystalline lamp that, when Aearis lit it, cast the perfect likeness of the night sky upon the walls of the room. A set of three illuminated volumes detailing the rise and fall of Doriath. A set of vibrant paints and a fine horse-hair brush. Several scrolls of paper of the best quality. Two fine, thick fur cloaks with silver fastenings. A long, bright dagger of extraordinary make.

"All this… for a few poems?" breathed Bereneth.

"I only charged the wealthy ones, of course. The Thororion twins got theirs for free. Good poems-not 'claptrap,' as you so vividly put it."

"Ah yes, I am sure they are thrilled with your services. At least they will be, until they realize that you are helping them court the same woman."

Aearis did not appear to hear the implied reproach.

"This lot was meant to be your gift of Majority. Or your dowry. Whichever came first."

Bereneth scanned the small hoard again, and she could not decide whether to be exasperated or touched.

"We cannot keep these," she said after a mild struggle with herself. It really was a wonderful dagger. "... can we?"  
Aearis's smile lit her face with wicked triumph. Bereneth reached out an unwilling hand to feel the fur of one of the cloaks. By Vana, it was soft.

She sighed deeply, for she knew that the battle was already lost.

* * *

Several weeks after the "Nightshade Incident," as Elrond called it, Bereneth awoke early on a chilly morning to find Aearis curled into a chair in her bedroom, staring intently at her face. Bereneth shuddered under the pressure of the glittering eyes. She held the gaze until it became rather too much for that hour of the morning.

"Do you need something, Aearis?" she asked politely.

"What are you doing today?"

It was a trap. She knew it was a trap. But, as she saw it, her options were to struggle in vain only to succumb at last to Aearis's will, or to circumvent the effort altogether and surrender in advance. It was early, and cold, and Aearis looked terribly hopeful with her eyes wide and her chin rested on her knees. Bereneth sighed.

"I don't know, Aearis, what _am _I doing today?"

The girl's face burst into a brilliant smile and she leapt to her feet.

"I am so glad you asked, my friend! Alphear and Alassir are saddled and ready outside, and I have taken the liberty of laying out winter clothes for you. I shall be outside when you are dressed!"

Then she breezed from the room, leaving Bereneth to dress quickly and speculate about what she had agreed to this time. On her way out, out of pure habit, she slung her bow and quiver over her back. Aearis laughed when she saw her.

"Expecting trouble?" she asked.

"I am certainly not ruling it out, given present company." Bereneth replied, shooting her companion a pointed glance. Aearis only smiled and mounted Alphear, the smaller of the two Lorien horses.

"Really now, you wound me. I would never lead you into danger!" She tried to look offended, but the attempt was half-hearted at best. To this, Bereneth could only respond with a stare of disbelief. "Oh that isn't fair," Aearis said, in response to her unspoken correction. "That was _important. _And anyway, I did try exceptionally hard to dissuade you from following me into that particular bad idea."

Bereneth could hardly disagree with that. Aearis was nothing if not infuriatingly protective. But that was their tacit understanding: where Aearis went, Bereneth would follow, against all reason and discouragement that could be. It was simply the way of things.

It was only when they had crossed the southern border of the haven, riding several leagues close along the base of the mountains, that Aearis revealed their purpose.

"We are riding for Swallow's Rest," she said, as though unveiling a great marvel. "It is a Mannish town with a rather lovely winter market. I thought we could both use the diversion." She smiled at her friend's surprise. "Is it really so hard to believe that I had an idea that involves neither mischief nor mayhem?"

Bereneth chose not to answer.

The market at Swallow's Rest was, indeed, rather lovely. The villagers had strung the houses and stalls with small, brightly-colored paper lanterns and hung pretty, tinkling charms in the trees. A great bonfire roared at the center of the town square, and a group of minstrels played simple, joyful tunes beneath the eaves of the largest inn, The Sleeping Giant. The snow fell more gently than in Imladris, drifting down in dreamy, dancing eddies and alighting gently on their tongues and lashes. The minstrels called out to Aearis immediately and she waved enthusiastically to them as she dismounted.

Bereneth beheld the little frosted village with wonder. The wooden buildings were small and squat, not at all elegant or refined, but certainly charming in their own modest way. These were not houses built to withstand the millennia unchanged, she reflected. They were a patchwork of recent and very-slightly-less-recent additions, constructed for expediency and warmth. She had always known, intellectually, that mortals generally had little imagination for the days that would come after their short lives. But Pelargir had been built with loftier ambitions in mind: to weather the ravages of time and storm and war and enshrine forever the great deeds of those who built it. This town had no such ambitions. It was built for today, for merriment and warm drink.

"How often do you come here?" she asked.

Aearis stood beside her and linked their arms in an easy, familiar gesture.

"Oh, every time I have a day off and no one to keep me amused within the valley borders," she replied. "Imladris is beautiful, and I love my work, but sometimes I miss my own kind." Bereneth flinched at those words, and Aearis noticed. "Oh, no, I did not mean that…" she trailed off, clearly uncertain what she _had _meant.

Slightly embarrassed, Bereneth struggled to master her visceral response. It was no secret that Aearis felt more at ease with mortals, and that her Choice remained before them like a looming specter. She knew that. It was the way of things. She accepted it.

But that day, with the snow nestling bright against her black hair, her cheeks and the tip of her nose glowing pink in the cold, and her eyes sparkling, Aearis was beautiful, and her arm was wrapped around Bereneth's. And the whole lovely, fragile construct that held up Bereneth's world would crumble to ashes and dust if she thought too hard about choices and Afterwards.

So she did not press; she smiled and patted Aearis's gloved hand as it rested on her arm, and thought instead of warm meat pies, candied nuts, and pretty carved figurines dancing in circles.

They wandered the market, pointing out presents that they might bring back. To Bereneth's surprise, Aearis produced a small purse of silver coins.

"Where did you get that?" she asked, hoping fervently that the answer would not horrify her. Aearis seemed to perceive her apprehension, because she laughed rather wickedly before answering.

"Nothing unsavory, I assure you! As I said, I come here quite a lot. Sometimes the innkeep gives me a meal and pays me a few coins for my services as a singer for the evening. Occasionally a generous traveler will give me a bit more. Not much at the time, but it adds up."

The minstrels were beckoning again and Aearis glanced at Bereneth, as if for permission. Bereneth smiled and nodded, and Aearis took her place among the players to general applause. The man at the front, dark-haired and bright-eyed just like Aearis, offered her his lute with a bow and played instead on a small pipe carved of dark wood.

Though they played only light, merry folk songs, Aearis's voice had never sounded quite so wonderful, so utterly unfettered as in that common town square in the dead of winter. Amongst the villagers of Swallow's Rest, Aearis seemed as simple and joyful as a child, perfectly at home and untroubled by questions of eternity. She seemed to vanish among them, lovely but unextraordinary.

It was petty and unfair to resent it, Bereneth told herself. How could she begrudge her friend this refuge from the constant demands of the elvish village? So she laughed and clapped along, and forced herself not to mind too much.

As she circled the market, she let herself adapt to the sound of the Common Speech. Compared to the refined Adunaic that Gimlith and Aearis spoke, Westron was a coarse language. Much of the melodic cadence and the softness from Sindarin influence had been stripped to leave a bare-bones tongue with little poetry or music to Bereneth's ear. But she took to it easily enough, and managed, by dint of copious gesturing and the Adunaic that she had learned over the years, to achieve a serviceable level of understanding with the local merchants. By the time Aearis returned from her impromptu performance, flushed and in high spirits, Bereneth was deeply engrossed in negotiations with the silversmith's daughter. Runhilde was a pretty lass; her thick, glossy hair was rich as chestnuts, and her warm brown eyes were large and kind. She looked at the two elven women with wide-eyed fascination, and the eager, almost hungry attentiveness with which her eyes raked over Bereneth's features was quite flattering.

"Aearis, do you remember remarking that Glorfindel is so conspicuous that he may as well put bells on his horse?"

As usual, Aearis balked slightly at the mention of the elf lord. Though she had never said it, Bereneth suspected that Aearis had taken it rather personally when Glorfindel left them in Imladris. She did not take well to being left behind. Nevertheless, she recovered quickly and bent over the table to examine the twinkling silver ornaments that Bereneth indicated. They were of excellent make-seven small silver bells, each ringing at a different pitch to create a pretty harmony.

"If only we had a way to give them to him," she said, almost under her breath.

Bereneth rolled her eyes.

"You do realize that we can send things to him, do you not? I have been writing him letters several times a year since he left!"

Aearis shrugged noncommittally, toying absently with her sleeve.

"You know how I am with letters. Written word could not capture in a thousand pages what a simple song would say in ten seconds."

Bereneth narrowly avoided rolling her eyes at the note of petulance in her friend's voice. _Singers. _

"Then send him sheet music for all I care! But for the love of all that is good, send him _something, _would you? He worries about you."

The petulance grew more pronounced and Aearis tossed her hair back haughtily.

"There is no need for him to worry about me," she muttered defensively. "I can take care of myself." She scowled at the incredulous laugh that escaped Bereneth's lips.

"You swallowed poison three weeks ago," she pointed out. At the mention of the Nightshade Incident, Aearis's manner softened slightly. She seemed to realize that her position was quite difficult to defend.

"No one ever talks about all the times that I _didn't _swallow poison," she groused. "Do you know how many opportunities I have to swallow far more dangerous substances in the Healing Halls?"

"It frightens me that you think that would be reassuring," Bereneth said. But she was chuckling despite herself. The sudden cloud over Aearis's sunny mood seemed to have passed, and they purchased the bells along with several finely wrought silver stars for Gimlith's hair. Runhilde favored Bereneth with a sweet smile as they turned to leave, her apple cheeks coloring to a deep, rosy pink.

Aearis looked back over her shoulder at the fetching girl as they left with their packages.

"She's pretty," she observed. Her tone was even, but her eyes were shining with mirth and excitement. "And rather taken with you, I thought."

Bereneth's face felt very hot against the chilling air. Of all the people to discuss this with, Aearis was hardly her first choice. The half-elven girl had made a very poor show of feigning surprise when several years ago Bereneth had, deeply distraught and blushing scarlet, confessed that she could only love women. But to Bereneth's relief, Aearis had always been sympathetic and discreet. Still, Aearis's pleasure at the idea of a real romantic prospect for her friend stung more than it should have.

"Come on," she said, as though she had not heard Aearis's gentle prodding. "I could use a warm drink." Aearis shrugged and followed her friend into the Sleeping Giant.

The interior of the inn was warm and fragrant with the smells of sweet mead, mulled cider, and succulent game roasting in the kitchen. Though their small purse was much lightened by their purchases from pretty Runhilde, Aearis quickly bartered a full meal of meat, cheese, and strong ale from the middle-aged, fair-haired woman who tended the bar.

They sat down to their meal pleasantly ravenous, and spoke little until they had finished every morsel of rich, earthy venison. The roaring fire at the center of the room thawed them quickly, and the warmth and the mead lulled them into a state of sleepy contentment. Enora, the blond innkeep approached them with a small, rather inferior-looking lute and a hopeful expression. With a minimum of token resistance, Aearis allowed herself to be induced to play a song or two. She sat down in a chair facing the hearth, her face lit with gold and her eyes dancing with fire, and began to play lazily. In her hands, the modest lute sprang to life. She sang was in the common tongue, and Bereneth suspected that she was composing on the spot.

The words spoke of a shieldmaiden, carved of marble by the finest craftsman in a city under siege. He wept for his beleaguered city, and took comfort only in the beauty of his sculpture, in whose face he found mercy and hope. And finally, when the war seemed lost, the powers above took pity on this man, for he was virtuous and kind of spirit, and one day he woke to find color in his shieldmaiden's cheeks, and when he clasped her hands he felt warmth in them. He begged the shieldmaiden to stay with him and be his wife, but she was brave and strong, and she charged out of the gates with eyes that blazed with love and vengeance, and the attacking army splintered before her…

Bereneth, concentrated on the ballad that Aearis wove capriciously out of thin air, did not notice the figure beside her until a small, plump hand on her shoulder caused her to start and look around.

"May I sit?" asked Runhilde in Westron. She had shed her thick winter cloak, and Bereneth could not help but note the way the firelight cast the lovely lines of her slender waist and broad hips into sharp relief. Up close, she smelled of chamomile and lavender. Unsure of what to say, Bereneth nodded. At the corner of her mind, she noticed that the music had suddenly become very romantic.

"Your friend is very talented," said the mortal girl quietly. But her warm eyes were not on Aearis. They were fixed on Bereneth.

"Yes," she replied hoarsely, and found that her throat was very dry. She took a long draught of ale. "Yes, she is… extraordinary."

"You love her so much." It was an observation, not a question. Bereneth's throat burned bitterly. "You love with your whole body. I can tell."

She had no answer for that. Runhilde's lips were full and pink, and the firelight flickered over them like a kiss.

"I don't mind," said Runhilde after a moment's silence. "You won't think of her while you're with me. I promise you that."

Bereneth felt lost, completely out of control of the situation. Aearis's voice was ringing in her ears, the sweet song coiling around her heart and constricting it. But Runhilde's small hand had found hers beneath the table, and it was warm and delicate when she wrapped her fingers around it.

"Promise?" she breathed, leaning in towards the warmth of the mortal girl. Runhilde leaned in too. Her rich brown eyes were consuming.

"Let me show you," she whispered, and the sound of her voice drowned out everything.

They rose together and left the inn, and when the door of Runhilde's bedroom shut behind them, Bereneth believed her.

* * *

They lay together in the gathering twilight. Runhilde's curtains fluttered under the gentle ministrations of the cool night breeze. The sweat on Bereneth's skin cooled quickly, but her flesh remained burning long after Runhilde had fallen asleep in her curious mortal repose-her eyes closed as if in death.

Bereneth traced the line of Runhilde's collarbone with a tentative, trembling finger. She marveled at the furrow that already haunted the girl's brow. To be born already dying. It seemed a tragedy so crushing that for a moment Bereneth could hardly breathe.

But oh, how lovely she was in her brevity. Warm and wise and brimming with the passion of her race, she was. Already an orphan at eighteen, carrying the weight of her father's legacy on her shoulders, defying the scorn of the villagers who doubted the ability of a pretty young woman to continue the family trade. Runhilde's monsters were not mythical shadows of fire and death like Glorfindel's. They were the cruelties of the everyday, and she fought them with all the nobility of spirit of an elven lord of old.

The darkness grew until even Bereneth's eyes could no longer see the soft lines of her lover's face. Distantly she was reminded that Aearis must be waiting for her to return, but to tear herself from the soft, comfortable heat of Runhilde's bed seemed an unbearable loss at that moment. So she stayed a while longer, cocooned in rough cotton and silken hair and yielding flesh.

* * *

With an uncharacteristic level of self-restraint, Aearis refrained from questioning Bereneth when the taller girl rejoined her by the horses. Under the light of the waxing moon, Bereneth's skin glowed with faint iridescence, and her eyes shone brighter than ever before. Aearis noted without comment that her friend's lips were red and swollen and her hair had been released from the customary single, tight braid to tumble loose and lustrous over her shoulders. She was marvelously beautiful.

They rode back mostly in silence. When they did converse, Bereneth seemed far away and distracted. Night had fallen dark and thick over the valley, and it pressed over Aearis's eyes like a blindfold. She sang softly to the shadows until they yielded slightly, backing away from the path enough to allow them to spur their horses forward. The way passed peacefully for a time, with the music of the wind howling through the bare tree branches and the smooth rocking of their horses trotting through the snow. But as they neared the border of the Vale of Bruinen, Bereneth pulled Alassir up short, and by the sliver of moonlight that still pierced through the gathering clouds, Aearis could see that her friend had gone stock-still, tense and alert.

She stopped and listened, straining to the uttermost edge of her hearing. Then, far away, she heard it. Snarling grunts, heavy footfalls, the chink of heavy armor. Though she had never met any such beasts before, she knew at once from the seething whispers and bristling of the trees that the noises were made by goblins. The sounds were growing closer as the two girls stayed frozen upon the path, and soon Aearis could determine that there must have been at least five of the foul creatures trudging down a mountain path towards them. She caught Bereneth's eye and jerked her head at the skeletal forest to their right. As they backed carefully into the shelter of the bare trees, Aearis pleaded in a voice soft and urgent for the wind to mask their scent and push away the clouds enough to let the moon reveal the foul orcs.

They waited in taut silence, and finally, trudging down the mountain path, twisted and mutilated as corpses on a battlefield, Aearis saw them. The smell hit her hard. It was copper, rot, soot, and fear. She could smell the screams of their last victims, shrill and desperate. Her heart thundered in her ribcage, faster than even nightshade had driven it. The orcs reached the path and looked around, sniffing deeply. The largest one spoke in a hideous tongue. He had the face of a fanged monkey, contorted in a permanent expression of cruel greed. His eyes were darting over the forest, seeking them. The message was clear: they knew that they were not alone.

Bereneth had drawn her bow and nocked an arrow, but she did not strike. There were too many, too close. Nine of them, each more hideous than the last.

Aearis cast her eyes around desperately, unsure of what she searched for. Three feet from her, she saw a pool of moonlight. It was worth a shot.

Quietly as she could, she drew out the silver stars from the marketplace and inched towards the errant moonbeam. As she moved, she murmured softly to the wind, hoping that it would favor her with one more boon. It picked up suddenly, and seized the words from her throat, throwing them towards the mountains. The orc party spun around to stare at the mountains for the source of the fell voice, which echoed through the stone faces. Aearis spat out infuriating taunts and venomous threats, and the wind bore them, spiraling around the goblins until the creatures were half-mad with rage and confusion. As she spoke, she caught the moonlight in the bright facets of the silver ornaments and made it dance over the mountains like a specter. With an ornament hanging on each finger and her voice dripping fear into their ears, she created a dancing army of fell elven warriors, flitting through the stones. Black arrows hissed from the orc's bows towards the phantoms.

Bereneth seized the opportunity to assail the mutated beasts with her own arrows, which cut through the dancing wind with vengeful accuracy. The creatures screamed and fell with arrows piercing their spines and blooming through their throats, never knowing the direction from which their death came.

But no lie could last forever.

Finally only three goblins remained, but they were quicker and cleverer than the others, and when the ghosts had begun flickering in the mountains they had hidden behind tall rocks and watched carefully. When their brethren were slain, the bravest of them emerged carefully, its shield protecting it from any more attacks from the forest. It inched closer, and Aearis could hear it sniffing for them, drawing ever nearer to their hiding place. The shadows flooded around the girls and their horses, concealing them as best they could, but the best had caught their scent now, and it was mere paces from Bereneth.

Then from the north, she heard the drum beat of an elven horse galloping down the ribbon of moonlit path. In the distance, coming over the lip of the valley's edge, a single figure, glowing under sky, raced towards them. The orc spun around to seek the new sound, and Bereneth took the opportunity to bury an arrow in its heart. The horseman was fast approaching, and fluttering out from beneath his shining helm Aearis thought she could see tendrils of golden hair.

_Surely, it couldn't be… _

The warrior rode down the remaining goblins with ease, his great sword bearing down to hew their heads from their thick, muscular necks with ease.

_It _**_couldn't _**_be. _

The horseman turned to face them, broad-shouldered and bright under the light of the moon. Slowly they came forward, and Aearis's heart was in her throat. He reached up and pulled off his helmet, shaking out a mane of blond hair.

"Good grief, Aearis, what damned silly idea have you had this time?"

Cestedir's hoarse voice was exasperated, but tinged with amusement as well. Her heart retreated, shrinking back into silence. She searched for the words to explain their situation, but found that none could pierce the thick taste of disappointment that lay over her tongue. Bereneth spoke instead.

"Neither of us were needed for training today, so Aearis thought we should go hunt for herbs," she lied smoothly. Aearis resisted the urge to throw her friend an admiring look.

_Since when could Bereneth lie? _

"All day?" Cestedir replied, plainly skeptical. Bereneth shrugged, her expression tranquil and unreadable.

"You know how much work it is to tire her out."

"Aye, I do at that," conceded Cestedir, though he appeared far from convinced. "Well, let us speak no more of it tonight," he said after scrutinizing both of their determinedly innocent faces. "Come on, then. Gimlith was worried sick."

"For us, or for the rest of Middle Earth?" Aearis asked lightly.

"Yes."

* * *

Bereneth never spoke much of Runhilde after that first night, but for many years after, she rode out often to visit the little town of Swallow's Rest. Often Aearis would ride with her, but at the Sleeping Giant they would part ways quickly, and Bereneth would disappear quickly until the twilight faded into night.

Curiously enough, only Cestedir could understand her situation well enough to give her comfort. One day, almost thirty years after that first winter's evening, she came to him with eyes shining with unshed tears and hands shoved deep into her pockets to stop them trembling. She had returned from a solitary trip to Swallow's Rest the night before and paced the streets of Imladris until dawn, for no beauty of tree nor star could soothe her tortured mind.

She sat down beside him as he drank his morning tea, her face gray and drawn. They sat in silence for a while, and he filled her cup three times before she found words.

"How do you bear it?" she said at last, her voice quavering in a most un-Bereneth way. He did not have to ask what she meant, but he took a long time to answer. He refilled the teapot with boiling water for a second brew.

"To tell the truth," Cestedir replied, speaking slowly and deliberately, "I don't, mostly."

Bereneth stared at him.

"What do you mean, you _don't _? You love a mortal woman. You build your life around her. But I don't see you break as I do when you see the silver in her hair. You don't panic when she sleeps like the dead every night. How do you bear to think of the time after her?"

Cestedir smiled sadly.

"To be honest with you, my dear, I think I've been dying since the moment I met her." He said it casually, almost cheerfully. Silence descended again, and Cestedir poured out the second brew of the tea. It was sweeter than the first.

"So…" she began slowly, fighting the constriction in her throat that threatened to choke her voice, "that's it? Just wait for her to die and then fade into a whisper among the leaves?"

Cestedir shot her a sharp, reproving look.

"You? No, of course not. You are young and burning, and you carry her on your heart like a brand. That is as it should be. But me…" he trailed off and sighed. "Do you have any idea how old I am, Bereneth?"

The question caught her by surprise. It was rather a delicate one to answer-one never knew what might give offense.

"No," she admitted. He chuckled.

"No, nor do I. I can't remember. When all my kin left for the West, I stayed. When the world shattered under the hand of the Enemy, I stood against him. Not for the Eldar or the Maiar or the Valar or any such people, but for the _earth. _I have been here for a very, _very _long time. When I met Gimlith, I finally knew why." The sun had risen over the horizon now, drenching the valley in pale light. For a moment, Cestedir was beautiful. "But as for you, my lass," he continued after a long, pensive pause, "I suppose you must simply bring her with you after she is gone."

"How?" she asked, almost begging for an answer. She felt heavy, as though a mantle was pressing down over her shoulders, crushing her under its weight.

"You know love now. It is heavy and jagged and devastating. Carry it, Bereneth. One day, it will carry you in return." He caught the angry look she threw him and smiled. "I know, I know, easier said than done. But if anyone can do it, you can. Bear her with you. You'll be glad of it one day."

But that day was long in coming.

* * *

Beyond her reputation among Men for the finest craftsmanship West of the Misty Mountains, little is known of Runhilde the Silversmith. She inherited her workshop when her father died of Winter Fever, leaving her orphaned at fifteen. To the consternation of all of Swallow's Rest, beautiful Runhilde never married. But she passed along the secrets of her sublime craft to her apprentice, Rozenn.

After her master's death, Rozenn spoke sometimes of a tall, gray-eyed woman who would often come to visit Runhilde. Tapered like leaves were the beautiful stranger's ears, and on clear nights her skin glowed like moonstone. But Rozenn had always been fanciful.

"Why," scoffed the village wise-women, "would one of the faerie-folk of the Vale of Loudwater deign to visit a common artisan?"

But for many years after old Runhilde died, and her body was interred at her behest beneath a willow tree by the river, village children returned from playing with strange tales. They spoke of a pale woman, clad always in shining mail and bearing a great bow, standing silently beside the willow tree, her fair face drenched with tears. The shieldmaiden, they called her. Like in the song.

* * *

**Author's note:**

This chapter was not originally planned, but I realized that I have a very clear idea of Bereneth that doesn't have much of a chance to come through in other chapters because Aearis is such a loudmouth and tends to drown everyone else out. Most of the Rivendell chapters will be a bit fluffy/light on plot advancement because that's how I imagine it feels to live there, but I hope they still feel important and interesting.

Also, I want it to make it clear to any biologists in the room (and OSHA, if you're watching) that I do NOT approve of mouth pipetting. But Aearis would. Hey, I never promised a sensible main character.


	9. The Lay of Narthanes

"Will no one tell me what she sings?—  
Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow  
For old, unhappy, far-off things,  
And battles long ago:

Or is it some more humble lay,  
Familiar matter of to-day?  
Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain,  
That has been, and may be again?"

-William Wordsworth, The Solitary Reaper

_Imladris, Spring 2863 SA _

In Imladris, spring was ever a time of shifts in the wind, and the season seemed to stir the hearts of the valley's inhabitants to the unexpected. Perhaps it was the fragrant pollen of the rare flowers that bloomed there that intoxicated the denizens of that fair haven. Or perhaps it was the whispers of the giddy breezes that twirled mischievously through the courtyards and gardens, sowing wild ideas and merry chaos wherever their laughing voices were heard.

Regardless of the cause, the morning of the fourth day of spring in the year 2863 of the Second Age, beside the sunlit river Bruinen, a captain of the guard and a dark lady of Elrond's inner council pledged themselves to be bound together with only the river to hear their gentle words of love.

Distant indeed was that golden shore where Lady Narthanes had surrendered herself to the moonlit man. Distant was the shadow of fear that had stretched out its hands to strangle that sweet, idyllic love. Distant was everything, except the crooked smile and the strange, direct gaze of Captain Cestedir, who looked upon her now with full understanding.

"You really do know me, don't you?" she murmured, raising a tentative hand to trace the line of his cheek.

"I do." The answer came with no hesitation. He caught the hand and kissed it, not reverently, but tenderly. "I know Gimlith of the Guard. I know Narthanes of Andunie. I even know the nameless lady who weeps in the night for her lost home, for her daughter's unknown doom, for the shadow that has claimed the heart of her kingdom, though her tears fall so quietly that none can hear."

"I wish-" she started, then stopped herself with a mirthless laugh. "But I am too old for wishing."

"Never, beloved." Cestedir lowered his head to kiss Gimlith tenderly, and she clung to him in a manner most unlike her.

"You know that I shall die. Not so very far from now."

"So you keep reminding me," he sighed.

"You'll hate me for it someday, Cestedir."

He caught her face between his hands and met her dark eyes squarely.

"I am not him, Gimlith. I know that you will die. I know that to love you is to accept that I cannot keep you forever. But _never _," he emphasized the word, hoping that she would hear it in earnest, "will I hate you. Not even for a moment." From her expression, she still seemed to be of a mind to argue.

"Put it this way," he said, trying another tack. "I am already hopelessly, irretrievably in love with you. That much has been settled. Furthermore, it is already commonly known throughout the valley that I spend my nights in your chambers. My virtue has been thoroughly despoiled-with a rather imaginative variety of techniques, might I add." Here she smiled despite herself and hit his shoulder softly. "If you won't marry me, Gimlith, all you will accomplish is to prevent me from annexing your collection of fine liquors after you die-as you assure me you will be doing."

She eyed him critically, but he saw, with the disbelief of one who had been fighting the same battle for many years and who now saw it suddenly won, a softening behind the scowl.

"You make it all sound rather inevitable," she observed dryly.

"I am merely presenting my lady with the facts," replied Cestedir, sweeping into an uncanny imitation of one of Glorfindel's more dramatic bows.

"Well then," said she, clasping his hands and bringing him close to her, "who am I to argue with the facts?" His breath hitched and tears sprung to his eyes.

And there, cloaked by the roar of the river and the shade of the willows, Narthanes danced again in the arms of one who loved her.

* * *

Bereneth burst through the doors of the Halls of Healing and careened into the central room, gray eyes wild and hair in an uncharacteristic state of chaos. Aearis rushed forward in alarm, quickly examining her friend for external signs of injury.

"What is it? Are you hurt?" She began to lead her friend towards a medical bed. "You weren't supposed to be on patrol today, why-"

"No, no, it's nothing like that," Bereneth interrupted. "It's finally happened, Aearis. She said yes."

Aearis stared into Bereneth's wild gray eyes for a moment, uncomprehending, before understanding blossomed over her face.

"You're joking," she breathed, sinking down onto the empty bed she had, moments ago, tried to force Bereneth into. "After all this time?"

Elrond entered the room from his private study and hurried over to the pair where they sat with their heads together.

"What's wrong?" he demanded, eyes darting warily between the two over-excited ladies of his court. He had learned through bitter experience to proceed with caution when he saw that conspiratorial expression in his apprentice's eyes. Aearis, spattered with blood and beaming with joy, leapt to her feet and embraced him.

"The sky is falling, Elrond, and the world has gone topsy-turvy! My mother is getting married!"

"You must be mistaken," said Elrond, shaking his head with a smile. "I distinctly remember the precise configuration of curses Gimlith hurled at me last time I presumed to ask whether she and Cestedir had any such plans. It was… extensive." He blanched at the memory.

"Nevertheless," said Bereneth, "the forces of reason have finally prevailed. May I abscond with your healer for the day, my Lord? There is much to be planned-for Gimlith wishes to be married within the year and I fear if we don't catch her now she will elope by nightfall."

"Please do. She has been maddenly productive all day."

Bereneth hooked her arm around Aearis's and towed her away, leaving Elrond to sink onto the vacated bed in silent consternation.

* * *

_Fading, 2863 SA _

The furious scratching of a quill filled the room, somehow deafening in the still Imladris evening. Occasionally, the sound was joined by profane muttering in Adunaic as the figure bent over the desk irritably crossed out a line or blotting away ink on her increasingly chaotic sheet of paper.

"I had no idea you were capable of working this hard," Cestedir said finally from the doorway. The scribbler did not appear to hear him, and he cast a concerned look over at Bereneth, who shrugged.

"She cannot hear you. I think she might be dead, and all of this," she gestured carelessly at the room, which was scattered with ink and crumpled sheets of paper, "is just elaborate rigor mortis."

"That would put quite a damper on the wedding. Perhaps Elrond can revive her…"

Aearis cursed as her quill broke. Wordlessly, Bereneth handed her a new one from a satchel.

"I am worried that this song has become the most expensive element of the festivities," she remarked. "Paper is not cheap." She watched Aearis work for a few more moments, then sighed and shrugged. "Come along, Cestedir. There is nothing more we can do for her." As she made to stand up, Aearis's free hand shot out to seize her wrist, though her other continued writing furiously.

"Leave the satchel," she growled. Bereneth set the spare quills gingerly on the table and Aearis's released her grip without looking up.

As they closed the door, Bereneth glanced at Cestedir.

"So? Is he coming?"

"No word yet."

The morning of the wedding passed in a flurry of constant activity. Aearis flitted about, obsessively checking every minute detail of the decorations and entertainment until Bereneth finally dragged her away to dress for the bonding ceremony, much to the relief of the beleaguered Lindir.

Guiding her friend with a firm, uncompromising grip on her right shoulder, Bereneth steered them to the cottage with little heed for Aearis's frequent attempts to dart back to the courtyard and settle "just one little problem."

"You have done enough," she repeated for the fourth time as Aearis remembered that she had not yet settled the wine list. "Let Lindir handle the rest." Aearis snorted.

"If I had left it to Lindir, he would have had the whole place littered with pink lilies. Lilies, Bereneth!" Aearis's Numenorean accent had come out in full force, as it always did in moments of agitation.

"That sounds pretty," she replied absently.

"For my mother? The smell makes her sick! It would have been a disaster!"

"May I remind you that Gimlith had to be forced practically at knifepoint to allow a public ceremony at all? Really, Aearis, I have never known you to be so preoccupied with such…" she trailed off, seeking a diplomatic word. "Frivolous nonsense" seemed unlikely to be received well by the frantic Aearis.

They entered the stone cottage that had been their home for the last forty years, and Aearis turned to face her friend.

"I know you think it silly. And it is. I concede that. But for the last one hundred years, my mother has lived her life for me. She lost everything for me. Her home, her position, her people..."

She didn't say it, but the thought echoed loudly through the room: _My father. _

She swallowed hard and continued.

"This place, this life… I cannot imagine how lonely she has been all these years. And now, finally, she has something of her own. She has a place here. I need to show her that. Everyone who sees her for all that she is, and who loves her for it."

"It is not silly," Bereneth said gently. "But it is rather a lot to expect of a single ceremony." She caught her friend's shoulders and fixed her with a steady gaze. "Promise me, Aearis, that tonight you will leave all this guilt locked far away. Sing your songs. Dance with pretty elven boys. Gaze with those hopeless moon-eyes at Elrond, if you really must." Aearis opened her mouth to utter a token protest, but Bereneth pressed a long finger to her lips and she was quieted. "But let tonight be as joyful as it ought to be."

Aearis stared long and hard at the face of her beloved friend, lost herself in the serene gray of her eyes, and for perhaps the first time she saw the full magnificence of the woman Bereneth had become.

"When did you become so very wise and so very beautiful, old friend?" she asked, reaching up to run a hand through Bereneth's long auburn hair. At the corner of her consciousness, she heard the hitch in the woman's breath, saw the flush in her pale cheeks. "Was it always so?"

"Oh, yes," Bereneth replied, her voice very nearly casual. "You are not nearly as observant as you think you are."

Driven by some unaccountable force, Aearis rose to her tip-toes and pressed a slow, sweet kiss to Bereneth's lips. The moment stretched out, fragile and precarious and tender. But the tall, elegant girl pulled away gently and stepped back with a sad shake of her head.

"No, my love, it is not quite so simple as that." She smiled a little and ran a finger over her lips thoughtfully. "If I thought you were ready to give me everything, perhaps. But I will not be one of the hapless suitors that you dally with and leave heartbroken in your wake." Once again, she hushed Aearis's protest.

"Someday you'll be ready for a great love, Azruari." The full force of her true name sobered the dark-haired lady. "But not soon. And not, I suspect, with me. No matter how much I might wish it."

"I do love you, Bereneth," she whispered. "More than anyone."

"I have never doubted that." The reply was spoken with a sudden, bone-deep sadness. "That makes it all the harder."

That night arrived sweet and clear, and when she saw the courtyard in the house of Elrond, lit by hundreds of glowing golden lanterns and filled with the music of Numenorean flutes, even Aearis could find nothing to reproach in Lindir's arrangements.

"Come now," laughed the merry minstrel, "you didn't really think I would use lilies for Gimlith's wedding, did you? Lilies! Can you imagine?"

He wandered away, still chortling.

"If he weren't such an excellent duet partner," grumbled Aearis, "I would poison him."

"I am sure you can find a suitable revenge that keeps his voice and fingers intact," Bereneth reassured her.

"True. He hardly needs legs. Though I do like dancing with him…" Aearis trailed off as Elrond gestured to the surrounding elves and they gathered by the fountain. Through the large double doors from the main hall, Cestedir and Gimlith entered the courtyard together. Cestedir's twilight-gray finery contrasted oddly with his rough face and untidy hair. But to Aearis, as she watched him gaze at Gimlith with a brilliant smile and eyes brimming with tears, he seemed the most beautiful man in all of Arda.

And who present that day would ever forget the dark lady of Andunie? Dressed in the custom of her people, in a blood-red dress that cascaded over her slender form as intimately as water, she caught the light like an exotic flower. The thousand lanterns danced over the silver beads in her black hair and in the depths of her eyes.

There in the warm courtyard, surrounded by those she loved, Aearis shook away a strange chill, like fingers running down her spine. Her heart suddenly beating very fast, she focused all her effort to fix the image of Lady Gimlith in her mind, every glittering detail. For the first time in many years, she thought of endings, of paths diverging, of the question still unanswered. But that day Gimlith was vibrant, glittering, and brimming with life, and the fire in her heart illuminated the courtyard with its blazing light.

In the years to come, that was the way Aearis chose to picture her mother: beautiful as starlight, powerful as the sea, fleeting as Spring.

It was not until she found herself called to the center of the courtyard to sing that Aearis managed to still the inexplicable, panicked pounding in her head. The words of bonding had passed quickly, for Gimlith's impatience with ceremony could not forbear the typical length of elven proceedings.

"Please, do speed it up, my lord," she had begged Elrond. "Not all of us are immortal, you know."

The song that Aearis sang that night had not been heard before in any form in either Numenor or Imladris. It was written in the style of a Numenorean lay, simultaneously merry and melancholy. The Lay of Narthanes, as it later came to be called, was no simple story. In the style that Gimlith had always preferred, the song spun the tales of the mariners that came and went from the golden shores of Andustar, and who told their stories to the constant beacon on the shores that lit their way home. Bereneth sang the part of the lighthouse in a low, sweet voice that ached with love and patience. Lindir, along with several of his finest apprentices, sang the parts of the ships that passed to tell their tales of sea serpents and naval battles. Aearis herself sang the part of the ocean-a soft, rhythmic chorus that harmonized behind the fiery, leaping songs of the mariners. Sometimes her voice would rise to tumultuous fury, crashing over the ships and laying them to waste. Then the song of the lighthouse would rise to meet hers, sweet and clear over the chaos.

So swept away was Aearis on the crests that rose and fell in the music that she did not see the figure that slipped into the courtyard and settled beside her on the lip of the fountain.

Then another voice joined the harmony, deep and bright, young and ancient. The voice of the stars, distant and longing. The other voices fell away, fading slowly to silence, until the sea and stars serenaded each other in a lonely duet. The song ended only when Aearis's voice trembled and stopped, and she lifted her eyes from the fountain, where they had been fixed for the whole duration of the song.

She blinked, dazed as if emerging from a long night into sudden daylight. For after nearly forty years of absence, looking into his golden eyes seemed as blinding as staring straight into the sun.

Silently, he offered her his hand (how could it still dwarf hers so? Had she not grown?) and she accepted it gratefully, for her knees seemed determined to buckle under her. They rose together, eyes locked. She looked for words, but none seemed to express quite how she felt at that moment. So instead she settled for a smile.

"You always did like a dramatic entrance," she said. He laughed and kissed her hand. The sound was sweet and so familiar that it made her heart ache. "You really are here, aren't you?" she murmured wonderingly.

"Do you doubt it, my Lady?" said Glorfindel.

"Only a little," she replied.

"Then," he declared, "if you will allow me a moment to speak with the joyous couple, I shall devote the rest of my night to convincing you."

* * *

Hard and cruel had been the road to Imladris from Lindon. Though he had left several days early, hoping to arrive in time to help arrange the festivities, even the roads of Eriador had grown perilous. Parties of roving orcs and cruel men waylaid him often as he made his way east, mistaking the lone rider for an easy target.

Occupied as he found himself clearing the roads, he had arrived far later than expected and rather the worse for wear. Upon reaching Elrond's house, he had stopped only for a quick, tepid bath before dressing and hurrying to the courtyard, where a song spun delicately from many voices spilled from the fountain at the center.

Vibrant and full of fire were the voices of Lindir and his troupe as they sang their boastful, fanciful tales. Then came the answer, soft as the fall of autumn leaves. From his position leaning against a column at the outer edge of the courtyard, Glorfindel stared at the maiden with the strong, gentle voice. Tall, she was, and slender as a willow, draped in shining, emerald-green silk. Her face was pale and luminous, almost opalescent, with a high, serene brow and large, clear gray eyes. The lanterns struck red into her crown of auburn hair. Gone was the lanky child with long, ungainly limbs. Gone was the furrow of self-doubt that had laid upon her brow forty years ago. Here stood a woman, loose-limbed, proud, and serene. As she sang, Bereneth's eyes found his and she smiled.

Then another voice joined the harmony. Quietly it started, but it crashed over him with breathtaking force. Through it echoed the horns of Ulmo, the rhythmic rocking of ships on the sea, the seductive pull of the tides. His eyes settled on the lady who sat on the lip of the fountain, her feet dangling loosely into the water. Faced away from him as she was, he could see little of her face beyond the dark hair that fell in chaotic eddies over her shoulders and down her back.

Without wishing it, without even noticing, he walked forward through the throng of enthralled spectators, kicked off his shoes, and lowered himself to sit beside her with his feet in the fountain. He dared not look at her as she sang, but he felt her presence sharp and sweet beside him. When he heard another voice join the harmony, mingling with hers, he realized slowly that it was his own. They sang together for a time. Though their eyes never met, Glorfindel felt the joining of their voices as intimately as a lover's embrace. And when the song ended, he felt the loss as keenly as a heartbreak.

Finally, as the hold of the song faded to a bearable ache, he dared to turn his eyes to she who sat beside him. She was blinking at him, disoriented. He helped her to her feet, and her warm hand in his served as reassuring confirmation that she did indeed stand before him in the flesh.

They exchanged a few words, but the sound of her voice distracted him from their meaning. She tugged him by the hand that still held hers and pulled him through the crowd towards Gimlith and Cestedir, who stood among a crowd of well-wishers that parted reverently before them. He bowed deeply over Gimlith's hand and she snorted in a distinctly unladylike way.

"What chivalric nonsense has the court of Lindon been drumming into you, old friend?" she demanded, though a smile softened her reproach. She clasped his hand firmly in hers, and he returned the pressure.

"Come now, beloved," Cestedir chided, "I thought we agreed not to bite any of the guests tonight."

"You neglected to tell me that Glorfindel would be attending," she retorted. "I would never have made any such promise if I had known."

Cestedir chuckled and wrapped an arm tightly around his bride's waist.

"What say you, my friend?" he said to Glorfindel, gazing at Gimlith with the light of love in his blue eyes. "Have I not won the finest bride in all the realms of men and elves?"

"Indeed, sir, I am baffled by your good fortune. I can only imagine that some foul trickery was involved." He turned to Gimlith, his face contorted in mock concern. "My lady, are you quite well? Has this foul knave taken your sight from you?"

But there was no mistaking the way Gimlith looked at Cestedir. Her dark eyes, usually as inscrutable as the depths of Moria, were laid open that night. And in them he saw trust as unshakeable as mountains and love as deep as the sky.

Glorfindel quickly found himself pulled into conversation with the newly married couple, and he reveled in their joy. When he finally looked around to find Aearis, she had vanished from his side. He found himself searching the crowd for her deep blue dress.

"Oh, don't worry too much about Aearis, my friend," laughed Cestedir, noticing his sudden distraction. "She'll be herding her small legion of beaux into a queue."

"I do wish she would do something about them," Gimlith complained. "I cannot leave the house without tripping over four or five of them strewn about at the door."

"Yes, Bereneth is far more tidy," Cestedir agreed with a grin. "She's established firm visitor's hours on Saturdays from noon till sunset. I wonder, my love, that you never taught your daughter the logistics of suitor management. You must have known that she would need it.

"Go on, Glorfindel," he teased. "If you want a dance with the fair lady, you ought to start lining up now." He gave his friend a rather wicked grin, and Glorfindel shifted slightly under Gimlith's black gaze-though he could not think why such harmless prodding brought a flush to his cheeks. He produced an airy smile and waved his hand.

"Leave such things to the young," he declared. "I am far too old for such battles."

Soon the courtyard was filled with dancing couples turning counterclockwise about the fountain as Lindir and his troupe took up their instruments and played merry tunes of both elven and Numenorean origin. Aearis danced constantly through the night, passing quickly from one pair of arms to another. The fluid skirt of her dark, brilliant blue dress flared about her hips as she twirled around the fountain, and her bare feet skipped over the tiles like stones over water.

Much changed was she from the strange, half-formed adolescent that Glorfindel remembered. Among the tall, graceful elves of Elrond's court, she was still of rather small stature, and her skin was rather darker than the fashion-the freckles that peppered her dusky cheeks must cause no shortage of consternation among the lily-pale ladies of the Sindar. Yet, with her full red lips and her dark, curling hair, her supple figure and ample curves, she had become an undeniably beautiful woman.

"Will you not dance, Lord Glorfindel?" asked a sweet, musical female voice from behind him. Startled out of his increasingly perilous line of thought, he turned to see Lady Ruineth Galoriel, the youngest advisor of Elrond's council.

In her pale green, draping silk dress, Ruineth looked lovely and elegant as any lady of Gil-Galad's court. She was renowned as a tastemaker in Imladris, and few now spoke even in whispers of her low birth. Her bright copper hair was coiled into an elaborate labyrinth of fine braids, which framed her face, with its limpid green eyes and charmingly pert nose, to great advantage. Forty years ago he had found her charms quite irresistible, and he had spent many an evening pleasantly occupied in her bed. So, smiling, he took her proffered hand and led her to dance beside the fountain, though he found himself often distracted from his lovely companion when Aearis's musical, bubbling laughter would ring out over the courtyard.

Later, staring up at the canopy above Ruineth's luxurious bed, Glorfindel's mind wandered to an ocean far away and westwards, where melancholy trumpets called out across the waves. He sailed towards them, chasing the sound with a desperately pounding heart, but they taunted him and faded away. The waves rocked him and cold sank into his flesh like a thousand cuts of a dagger. Wild, joyful laughter rang out through the moonless night, and the water rippled like the folds of a dark blue dress.

He leapt off the deck of the rocking ship, plunging towards the saltwater song that called him to the deeps. But instead he found himself carried away into the sky until he was lost among the stars, and the song of the sea faded from his hearing.

* * *

**Author's note:**

Okay, so, I am not good at declarations of love or at weddings. This much is known. That said, I did enjoy writing the next two chapters a lot more, so hopefully that translates to making them more fun to read as well.

Also, if the large cast of characters begins to get confusing (since I simply cannot stop coming up with new ones that I think would be fun to write), I could be prevailed upon to put a small "Cast of Characters" section in the notes for each chapter. So do let me know if that would be helpful!

Also, I currently have several more chapters of this posted on Archive of our Own than I do here, so if you're impatient, feel free to read it over there while I get my act together.


	10. Stirring

_ Imladris, 2863 SA _

Though he had come to Imladris with the express intention of staying only long enough to celebrate his friends' long-anticipated bonding, Glorfindel found himself furnished with an endless supply of reasons to extend his trip. First, Cestedir insisted that he step in to assume the captain's many duties while the newlywed couple vanished into the forest for several months to celebrate their union more privately. Then, a series of incursions by orcish raiding parties that passed alarmingly close to the borders of the hidden valley caused Elrond to beg his services as a strategic counselor. It was determined that the elven settlement, long defended by the goodwill of the trees and mountains, now required more robust defenses.

"You really are the only sensible choice to lead the effort, Glorfindel," Gimlith pointed out. "Who knows better than you how to hide an entire city in plain sight?"

Glorfindel had to admit-though indeed, he presented only token resistance to the idea-that he was uniquely positioned to direct the fortification of Imladris. For the first time in many years, he found himself able to look back on the Hidden City, now only a memory preserved in song, and find some pleasure in his recollections. He rediscovered the satisfaction of the creation of strong, beautiful things. Of walls resilient and discreet, that eluded the vision of unfriendly eyes but that could withstand the battery of cruel hands.

Oh, Imladris was a far cry from Gondolin. Gondolin had towered, grand and magisterial, imposing its will upon the young world and taming the wilderness to meek obedience. Gondolin had been a monument to the great and terrible will of the Noldor: blindingly, mercilessly perfect.

In comparison to that lost city, Imladris was a humble village indeed. Untamed and unfettered, the wilderness flourished with brambles and keen-eyed predators. Water rushed with power unchecked through the valley, and in the night the many voices of the mountains, the river, the forests, filled the air with their songs of primal ferocity.

Visitors passed freely in and out of Imladris; Men, elves, even dwarves, found themselves welcomed by Elrond's tranquil smile, warmed by his fires, moved to tears by the songs of his halls. Longer and longer Glorfindel found himself tarrying in the hidden valley, and details of his plans to return in his letters to Lindon became vaguer and less promising as the months passed. Finally, a letter arrived from Cirdan, steward to Gil-Galad himself, with orders for Glorfindel to remain in Imladris until further notice in order to aid in the fortification of Elrond's domain.

Glorfindel couldn't help but smile as he read the imperious letter, imagining the gentle coaxing by which kind old Cirdan must have induced the proud king to accept Glorfindel's absence. The letter itself was clearly meant to tacitly reassert Gil-Galad's authority over the comings and goings of his officers-to succumb to the reality of the situation without surrendering ground.

So, by the will of the High King himself, Glorfindel stayed. And if-for reasons entirely his own-he rejoiced in those orders, he kept his own counsel.

* * *

_Mithlond, 1690 SA _

The arrival of Glorfindel of the Golden Flower in Lindon breathed new life into the kingdom of Gil-Galad. The battles that devastated the fair land of Eregion began to turn when Glorfindel rode at the front lines, his blazing presence driving back the Enemy's foul armies like a purifying flame.

He was as gentle and joyous in repose as he was fierce in battle, and his presence in the Gil-Galad's court at Mithlond illuminated the grand halls with music and laughter. And even in that fair court by the sea, where all the greatest of the elves assembled, there was only one lady whose beauty and pedigree could match his. Her hair fell in silver ripples like the Falls of Rauros, and her eyes were like errant stars fallen from the sky and caught between her long lashes. So sang the minstrels of the court, and Glorfindel could not help but agree. Where she walked, her pale glow lent beauty to all that lay in her path. Lovely and still as she was, she reminded him of the tranquil loveliness of the city of Tirion. Her sweet voice returned him to the constant music that echoed through Valinor.

And she was gracious, and clever, and she loved him like she loved the sun.

Whenever he returned from a battle, bloodied and weary, her cool hand soothed his furrowed brow and her songs cleared away the echoes of clashing metal and cries of agony. After the peace of Aman, the coarse, cruel world to which he had been returned chafed cruelly at him until he felt like an open nerve laid bare to all the vicious whims of Middle Earth. Only with her did he find shelter from the harsh, abrasive land. So, he pursued her. It was only right, after all.

Whispers quickly filled the court with rumors of the inevitable bonding of Glorfindel of Gondolin and Celebrian of Lorien. At every ball, they flooded the hall with their combined light. In the shaded groves in the grounds of Gil-Galad's palace, he whispered sweetly to her, serenaded her with pleasing songs of praise for her beauty and grace. No prettier courtship could the denizens of Mithlond have wished for, nor any finer and more proper match.

But not even Glorfindel could turn the tide of the war on his own, and slowly the forces of Sauron crept westwards towards Lindon. By sheer superior numbers the armies of Gil-Galad found themselves routed and driven back, until only the passion of the river Lhun stood between Lindon and total defeat. Eregion shattered and fell, and Elrond's forces returned in a state of devastation from the ravaged realm.

Glorfindel's soldiers fought bravely and died badly upon the points of orcish sabers. He rode ever at the front, cutting through the dark hordes with his tireless arm. But every day, the forces of Lindon diminished, and the banks of the Lhun were bathed in elvish blood.

_The bank of the River Lhun, 1701 SA _

Glorfindel watched the bloody sky as another pale winter sun set over a field of the dead, until the riot of color faded to the gray gloom of dusk. The snow upon the river bank was tainted with the colors of rust and ash.

Destruction haunted the once-fair river, poisoning the water and killing the slender reeds that had once danced beside it. Now only the wild brambles that fought their way past the thick, cold mantle of filthy snow persevered. Here and there, brilliant red flowers bloomed among the thorns like drops of blood. Glorfindel knelt beside one of the thick, cruel vines and extended a finger to trace the delicate blossoms, paying no mind to the vicious scratches that the thorns inflicted on his hands.

He looked out over the crystalline snow, crushed underfoot and stained, then back at the brambles, and for the first time he was overcome with wonder for this straining, choking world. Then, faraway but insistent, he heard the strident cry of war horns. The sound was swiftly drawing closer, and soon it was joined by the thundering of galloping horses and the beating of drums. Then, over a hill to the West, a glimmer in the gray.

It was in that dimming light, standing in a blood-soaked battlefield as hope waned that Glorfindel saw for the first time the full glory of the dawn of Men.

The force of the Numenorean cavalry washed over the land like a tidal wave, crushing Sauron's forces beneath their inevitable advance with ceaseless energy. Admiral Ciryatur's men rode forward with heedless bravery, and killing and dying apparently without fear of regret. Glorfindel rode with Ciryatur himself, swept along by the current of their vitality until the goblin army, surrounded on several fronts by the armies of Lindon and Numenor, were driven back towards the East and Sauron himself was forced to slip away, defeated and humiliated.

Then, as quickly as they had appeared, the men of Numenor returned to their ships and vanished across the sea.

On the night that the armies of Numenor departed Middle Earth, Glorfindel walked to the pier of Mithlond, his heart heavy with a new kind of sadness. He found Ciryatur overseeing the delicate process of coaxing the proud Numenorean steeds onto the decks. He was tall and broad-shouldered, with the rough, long-fingered hands of a sailor. Power was coiled in every motion, but so too did kindness shine in his every expression. His eyes were dark, but they glittered with restless energy, and his brilliant smile lit his handsome face and softened his fierce beauty.

"Leaving so soon?"

Ciryatur smiled regretfully and looked out over the fair harbor.

"Alas," said he, "the wind swells our sails and calls us away. And I confess, though I have never been one to long for home, when I think of the lady who waits for me in Andunie I find myself impatient to return." His gaze wandered towards the West, and the light of love shone in his eyes. "Someday I hope you will see the shores of Andustar when they are bathed in the summer's light."

"And shall I meet this lady, who has subdued the greatest warrior of Numenor?" asked Glorfindel, smiling at the blush that rose to the admiral's swarthy cheeks.

"She is not what you imagine, you know. Echiaril,* they call her in the city, for she is as wild and fierce as climbing vines and lovely as the flower among the thorns. She would have come to fight herself if she were not carrying our first child."

"I suppose I should expect nothing less of the lady who captured the heart of the great Admiral Ciryatur," said Glorfindel. For a moment, he thought of those insistent, flowering brambles fighting their way through the bloody snow. "I had met very few of your race before this cursed war, my friend, but now I wish I could know you better."

The Man chuckled.

"Then we shall start with my true name, for if you call me by that name in Andunie, Echel will mock me mercilessly for the rest of my life. For everyday use I am called Azruzor among my men. But in my father's court in Andunie I am named in the language of your people, Aegrostor*."

"You honor me with your confidence, my friend," said Glorfindel with a deep bow. "I look forward to meeting the child of the piercing rain and the bloody thorn."

Glorfindel kept company with the Men of Numenor until they departed that evening, and he remained on the pier while their pale silver ships vanished into the gathering darkness. For a few wild moments he thought of climbing aboard one of those fine, proud ships and letting himself be carried away to new shores. But then he thought of the devastation that lay upon the realms of his people, of the mourning mothers and the vast fields of graves, and he remembered where his duty lay.

But when he returned to Gil-Galad's court, he saw the lovely young faces of the attendant elves, heard the clever compositions of the court minstrels, admired the grace of the fluttering hemlines and glittering gemstones, as if from thousands of miles away.

When the Lady Celebrian sought him out, he excused himself with sad smiles and gentle excuses, until the day when she departed the court to return with her parents to the fair forest beyond the Misty Mountains.

On the day Celebrian left, Elrond and Glorfindel watched her star-bright hair recede into the distance from a high tower. Elrond's knuckles were white and his clear gray eyes misted over. When she had vanished from their sight, he turned to stare uncomprehendingly at Glorfindel.

"How could you let her go? You are loved by the most perfect lady in all of Arda, yet you sit idly by as she leaves!" His voice cracked with emotion, and Glorfindel was overcome with pity for the lovelorn heart of Elrond Half-Elven.

"Indeed, my dear friend, she is perfection itself," Glorfindel murmured, his eyes still lingering where Celebrian had vanished.

"Then how-" Elrond burst out, breathless with grief, "why-what kind of creature are you to refuse her love? A love any other would give up kingdoms for!"

Glorfindel weighed his response for a moment, for even he could not quite explain why he had jilted the loveliest maiden in all of Middle Earth. Finally he spoke, his voice softer than Elrond had ever heard it.

"I have lived in perfection. I have breathed it, I have greeted one perfect morning after another with joy in my heart, I have danced in the streets and alleyways and great halls of perfection. And I have stood in the dimming light of perfection as it fell, as corruption laid waste to its body. I have fallen from grace. I have seen the beautifully brittle heart of perfection shatter under the weight of the world.

"I have already loved and lost and mourned perfection. If I am to live here, in this world of twilight and long shadows, I must learn to love that which is sprung from the earth, scarred by the blade, and swept by the wind and sea, and which persists undeterred. I seek the beauty of wild, earthly things, not the distant light of stars. I could not be the shining champion the Lady Celebrian seeks any more than she could be my climbing thorn."

"You were offered joy and tranquility, yet you long for suffering and confusion," muttered Elrond. "How will you know when you find this wild rose? How do you know she will be worth it?"

"I hope," sighed Glorfindel, reaching out to squeeze Elrond's trembling white hands, "that I shall know it when I see her."

* * *

_Imladris, 2873 SA _

The hall of healing was in a state of high-strung, quiet frenzy. The rooms hummed with the murmured instructions of the healers who rushed from bedside, pale and tired. Every so often, a low moan or a stifled cry would pierce the mantle of subdued anxiety that lay thick over the occupants. Glorfindel, stood beside a high stone table draped in a blood-stained sheet, restraining a dying officer as Aearis poured a sleeping draught down his throat and sang a soft song of soothing. Sulogon's midsection had been torn open in a jagged line by an orcish scimitar, and his own heart had industriously pumped the blood out of his body even as Cestedir raced back to Elrond's house with the dying elf balanced on his horse.

Now he lay open on the table, his eyes rolling feverishly in their sockets. Glorfindel grasped his shoulders and pushed him down against the white sheet, pinning down his gaze. Sulogon's eyes were wild and frightened as a hunted boar's, shining with unnatural light.

"Captain," rasped the wounded man, reaching up a trembling hand to pull weakly at the collar of Glorfindel's collar, "Captain I am so frightened. I cannot die yet. I have never seen the forests of Lorien, or sailed upon the waves at Lindon, or loved a maiden-" he choked on blood and tears and lapsed into hopeless sobs. Aearis took the moment of stillness to clear his airway and force the draught into his mouth. She stroked his hair and whispered inaudibly in his ear and Glorfindel clasped his once-strong hand as the man drifted off slowly.

"Fetch me the vial of wolf-lily extract," Aearis said when Sulogon had finally lapsed into fitful unconsciousness. "And find me a few hardy volunteers. I need to find a blood-match if he is to live through the night." Glorfindel departed silently as Aearis returned to her work, singing softly to awaken her patient's fëa as her steady hands worked to repair his brutally damaged organs, willing him to fight the cold grasp that threatened to claim him.

The healers of Rivendell worked tirelessly for three days and three nights as the ten casualties of the attack of the orc horde hovered between life and death. On the morning of the second day, Glorfindel departed with three others to slaughter the remainder of the horde, which had tried to flee towards the east. They rode down the foul creatures mercilessly, but Glorfindel found no comfort or satisfaction in the sight of dark, viscous blood dripping from his sword.

He returned that night, shoulders heavy, and went immediately to the halls of healing where Elrond and his companions continued their labors uninterrupted. In the constant flurry of fitful movement as healers scurried to and fro and the injured tossed restlessly in their beds, Aearis was a single point of stillness.

She sat beside Sulogon's bed, and he saw that the young soldier was awake and her hands were clasped in his. They were speaking quietly, and she was smiling brightly at him. But instinctively he saw the tension in her shoulders, the tightness of her jaw, the slightest crease of her brow. He moved slightly closer to hear them as they spoke.

"...and where will we live? I confess, I am rather partial to the seaside, but I could be persuaded to nestle up in the mountains." Her voice was soft and sweet as a lullaby.

"Oh, certainly the mountains," Sulogon replied. His voice was weak and fading, but for the moment it was full of joy. "For if I ever miss the sea, I can find it in your eyes, my lady. I shall build us a cottage from the red trees that grow in the snowy forests, and bring you the finest, fattest game each night."

Aearis smiled, and for a moment her eyes found Glorfindel's. The smile that lit her face mingled with sorrow and compassion. He could see plainly in her face that Sulogon, hardly more than a boy, was dying. She held his pain in her breast and extended her spirit to nourish his, softening his last moments into a pleasant daydream.

The white kerchief tied over her hair had let a few tendrils of hair escape, and they hung in lank, exhausted tangles against her temples and clung to the nape of her neck. Her eyes were rimmed with red and her sockets hollow and dark, but they shone nonetheless. Beneath the olive tone of her skin her face was pale and bloodless, though her robes were flecked with darkening coppery flecks. The songs of healing had left her voice raw and hoarse, but it was still low and strong as the roar of the Bruinen. Her hands were small and soft as rain, but they were steady.

Stained, sapped, and shrouded in death as she was, never before had she seemed quite so beautiful as now, spinning a sweet lie around the dying man. In that brief instant when their eyes met, Glorfindel felt a strange tugging in his chest, and an odd feeling settled in behind his ribs. If he had to identify it, it felt closest in its urgency and sharpness to fear.

She returned her gaze to Sulogon's, but Glorfindel's eyes remained transfixed on her tired face.

"And I shall keep the fire burning all day and all night," she said, "so warm and bright that the winter won't dare peek its head in our door."

"And our children…" Sulogon broke off with a strangled cough, and pain twisted his handsome face, and she took up the sentence.

"Four of them," she said firmly. "Tulussel is the eldest. She is quiet, and worries too much, for her younger brothers are as brave and as incorrigible as their father."

"She'll have your eyes," he said dreamily.

"And your brow," she murmured, smoothing his forehead with a small hand.

Glorfindel walked away, aware that he had witnessed a moment all the more intimate for its brevity. Aearis sat for the rest of the night with Sulogon as they lived out a lifetime, even as the young elf's body failed and his heartbeat stuttered to a halt.

She waited until the last warmth faded from the hand that still clasped hers before rising to her feet and closing his clouded green eyes. Then she pressed her lips to his fair brow and moved silently to the next bed, where a bandaged soldier had begun to whimper in his sleep.

By the end of the third day, six of the ten injured elves had recovered enough to be deemed out of the most tenuous phase of recovery. One more lay in a sleep so deep that none, even Elrond, could say whether he would ever wake. The other three were quietly buried that afternoon.

Aearis and Lindir sang a burial song, unaccompanied by instruments. After three days of continuous songs of healing, Aearis's voice was so hoarse that every note seemed to cost her life's blood. But the whispering song carried all the helpless grief, all the rage and confusion that tore at the hearts of the assembled mourners. When she finished the song, Glorfindel's sharp eyes noted a slight tremor in her knees, as if they were about to buckle. The sharp, cruel feeling in his breast roared, and in an instant, just as she began to fall, he was beside her. He steadied her with a careful arm around her narrow shoulders.

"Peace, Azruari," he whispered, too quietly for any but she to hear. "Time to rest. Can you walk?"

She looked up at him with bloodshot eyes and smiled weakly.

"Why? Do you propose to carry me?" she asked, in a tone that he supposed was meant to be lighthearted.

"The thought crossed my mind," he admitted. "You are spent, my friend. No one would think less of you if your legs betray you."

She shook her head and straightened her posture.

"No, Glorfindel, I'm afraid that I cannot allow myself such an indulgence." So saying,

She stepped away from his grip and clasped her shaking hands behind her back. The feeling shuddered at the sudden separation and he fought down the urge to pull her back to him. "None of us healers are in any state to treat all the broken hearts it would cause if you were seen carrying a swooning lady to her bedroom."

He chuckled and fell into step with her emphatically purposeful stride.

"You exaggerate my exploits," he insisted, though his protest rang rather hollow.

She shot him a wry sidelong smile.

"Do I?" she said, a hint of a challenge lighting her tired eyes. "My mistake. I suppose I imagined all the evenings when you and Counsellor Ruineth vanish from the Hall of Fire at the same time..." That stopped him short.

"You know about that?" he asked, now rather flustered.

"Glorfindel," she replied, mirth mingling with something slightly sharper as she turned to face him, "_ everyone _knows about that. I am told that this is the longest… dalliance of yours yet recorded."

Glorfindel searched for a rejoinder, for though there was no accusation or reproach in Aearis's voice, he felt an urge to justify himself. But they were interrupted as Elrond caught up to them. His face looked just as pale and drawn as Aearis's. Glorfindel saw that at the sight of the half-elven lord, a deep pink flush rose to her cheeks and a new sparkle lit her eyes even as she cast them downwards.

It was plain to everyone that Aearis nursed tender feelings for the lord of the house. Everyone, of course, except for the object of her affections himself. Glorfindel marveled that anyone with flesh and blood could overlook her the way Elrond seemed to.

"Ah, Glorfindel," said Elrond, smiling through his exhaustion, "thank you for escorting my apprentice back home. Are you alright, Aearis? I had hoped that you would have far more time and training before any such strenuous task."

"I am well, thank you. Glorfindel is only ensuring I don't trip over any roots on the way home."

"Healing is a dangerous art. Are you sure-"

"Actually," interrupted Aearis, a sudden gleam lighting her eyes, "I am pleased to have you both in the same place." Elrond and Glorfindel exchanged apprehensive looks, suddenly suspecting that they had walked into a trap. "Patrols are forced to ride out further and stay out longer every time, and casualties are rising. Six soldiers died in the last year alone, and Magron lost an arm just because we couldn't reach him soon enough." Glorfindel listened, increasingly sure that he knew where this was going. "If there had been a healer out there-"

"Absolutely not." Elrond's voice was sterner than Glorfindel had ever heard it.

"But Elrond-"

"How many times must we have this conversation, Aearis?"

"As many as it takes to convince you," she replied. Her girlish embarrassment seemed to have evaporated, replaced with iron determination that Glorfindel recognized from countless disagreements with Gimlith over the years. There was no aggression in her tone-only a mulish perseverance that was, in truth, far harder to prevail over.

"That is very much what I feared," sighed Elrond, raising his hands subconsciously to rub his temples.

"We could save more of our people if we rode out with the guard," she insisted. "Sulogon would have survived if we could have stemmed the bleeding immediately. And-"

"Enough, Aearis," said Glorfindel, quietly. "This is not the time for an argument."

"No, the time was years ago, when the goblin hordes started appearing. Bereneth is out there right now, and I should be with her. I cannot potter about the gardens singing silly songs and setting sprained wrists while my friends are dying without anyone there to ease their pain."

"And what do you think you would do while the soldiers fight?" demanded Elrond. "Even without the minor matter of getting yourself killed, you would be a liability."

"I can defend myself," she retorted, clearly stung. "Glorfindel, you've seen me fight." She looked at him expectantly, and he turned pale. He was aware as he looked at her that she would not easily forgive him for what he had to say.

"Yes, I have seen you fight," he said noncommittally.

"And?" she prompted, apparently convinced that he would agree with her.

"And… you fight well-"

"_ Thank _you. You see, Elrond?" But Glorfindel held up a hand to silence her.

"You fight well," he continued, "_ for a noblewoman _." She stared at him as though he had just slapped her, and he hastened to explain himself. "You do well enough from the shadows, and you can disappear when you need to. But in the full light of day? Fighting proper soldiers with more strength and height and training? You would be killed in seconds, Aearis. You nearly _were _, remember?" She opened her mouth to protest, but Glorfindel continued speaking. "But you are right. We do need trained healers in the field. Elrond, I believe that Halloth and Calemir are well-trained in swordsmanship."

Elrond blinked at him and nodded reluctantly.

"They have not fought for many years, but I suppose, if they are willing…"

"And Aearis, perhaps you could teach some of the soldiers to administer more advanced field care."

She shot him a dark look, but he held her gaze until the indignation abated slightly. She closed her eyes, breathed deeply, and nodded.

"Fine," she said after a long pause. Glorfindel released a breath that he hadn't realized he was holding when she smiled at him. "On one condition."

* * *

_2875 SA _

Aearis gasped as her back hit the ground and the air was driven from her lungs once again. She stared up at the blindingly blue sky, waiting to recover her breath. She felt painfully aware of every inch of her aching body, but she still ignored Glorfindel's proffered hand as she made to get to her feet once again.

"What went wrong this time?" Glorfindel prompted her as she straightened out and winced, his tone maddeningly didactic.

"I went on the offensive too quickly," Aearis recited. "I sacrificed my balance for a reckless attack."

"That's right," he said. "You move more quickly than you think. You must always act from a state of balance."

"In my defence," she grumbled, rubbing the blossoming bruise where the heel of his palm had hit her sternum, "I _really _wanted to hit you."

"Believe it or not, Sauron's armies are even less likable than I am, so you may as well learn a bit of forbearance. Again!" The last word was barked, and Aearis groaned internally. Her own stubbornness prevented her from begging a reprieve even though he had already covered her body in bruises. Or from regretting her foolish demand that he train her in combat.

Aearis resumed her fighting stance, softening her knees and raising her hands protectively. They circled each other, darting in and out of range. His reach was longer, and she was forced to duck and weave constantly to avoid his quick, brutal strikes. This time she waited until his guard seemed to drop temporarily before striking. But as her hand snaked out, he caught it easily and twisted until he had it contorted behind her back and his other arm wrapped around her throat and lifted her, pinning her against his chest. She swore extensively in Adunaic as she tried to break his hold, but his grasp may as well have been manacles of steel. When he released her, she nearly crumpled to the floor, but he extended his arm and she leaned heavily against it. Frustration crushed her and she looked up at him hopelessly. He looked perfect as ever, haloed by the sun, serene, and gently smiling. The only sign of exertion was a becoming flush in his cheeks and a very slight heaviness in his breath.

"I'll never be good enough, will I?" She winced at the weakness in her own voice. He grinned down at her, golden-bright and guileless.

"Oh don't be so dramatic," he chuckled. "Two years of training, and already you resign yourself to failure? Once you have learned patience, Aearis, you will be a force to be reckoned with indeed."

"Now I _desperately _want to hit you," she muttered, fighting in vain to suppress a smile of her own.

"Well then, what are you waiting for? Again!"


	11. Heat

"She wanted, with her fickleness, to make my destruction constant; I want, by trying to destroy myself, to satisfy her desire."

― Miguel De Cervantes, Don Quixote

_Imladris, 2880 SA _

The summer swelled unusually long and hot in Imladris. That year marked a sudden decrease in goblin incursions, trees overflowed with fine fruit, and several children were born in the village for the first time in decades. And so, the valley's inhabitants rejoiced in their respite, and a mood of carefree exuberance took hold. The air itself seemed as intoxicating as fine wine.

The midnight before the first day of that sweet summer found Aearis up to her arms in bodily fluids as she knelt at the foot of a private bed in the halls of healing. Her knees ached from hours on the cold stone floor, and her head pounded with Faeleth's screams as the beleaguered woman labored to push an apparently melon-sized head out of her belly.

From the beginning, it had been a difficult birth. The baby had begun its entrance into the world stubbornly feet-first, and it had taken all the combined will of Elrond and Aeris to coax the child into a better position. Noenor, usually the perfect picture of a solemn, unruffled counsellor, paced the room in a state of frantic agitation, pelting the healers with questions and panicking like a flighty horse.

Nevertheless, Aearis found that once she had forced Noenor into a chair by his wife's side-with strict instructions to remain quiet and grasp Faeleth's hand-and negotiated an uneasy truce with the stubborn infant, she had little to do but watch the scene unfold and sing a soothing song. The child, Saelor, emerged with a deafening cry, small fists balled, face red and screwed up in displeasure. Aearis smiled down at the small complainant and handed him to her new apprentice. Therioril accepted him with a look of awe on her sharp, pretty face. Many years had it been since the valley had felt safe enough for the elves of Imladris to produce children, and the sight of the first summer child brought giddy joy to all who looked upon his small, angry face.

Aearis and Therioril worked quickly to cut the child's cord, clean him gently, and swaddle him soundly before handing him to the dazed new parents. Then Aearis began the more delicate operation of soothing Faeleth's body and inducing it to expel the remaining vestiges of her pregnancy. The final rush of blood and tissue thoroughly bathed her up to her forearms in red. Noenor seemed inclined to swoon again at the sight of her, so she excused herself quickly to scrub away the stains of the day in another room reserved for healers to sanitize themselves and their equipment.

She scrubbed herself for the better part of an hour, and her hair had been wrapped under a white cotton scarf, but she still felt thoroughly grimy from head to toe. Nevertheless, she donned a new set of white robes and returned to the labor room.

The first rosy flush of dawn pierced the white curtains that occluded the room from the outside world, and it fell gently over the young family. To Aearis's eye they seemed to glow softly. Noenor, his dark hair tied away from his angled, elegant face, still looked even paler than usual. But his bright blue eyes sparkled as he gazed down at his new son, who clasped his finger with a small, determined hand. Faeleth's rich chestnut hair tumbled down over her shoulders and her cheeks were flushed from exertion and love as she held the boy to her breast. Aearis retreated as quietly as she could; nothing was so urgent that it merited interrupting the bliss of the young family.

She returned to Elrond's private laboratory to give her report, and only when she stepped into the pleasant haze of herbal smells that perfused the room did she realize how tired she was. Though delivering children was a far more pleasant task than easing the pain of fatally wounded soldiers, elven children required a great deal of spiritual support to be guided into the world. The more energy the healer could provide, the less life the child would sap from the mother. Given Faeleth's fragile constitution, Aearis had poured every ounce of strength she could muster into her songs, and Saelor had lapped up every drop.

She swayed dangerously, and instantly Elrond was by her side, guiding her into a chair. Though she felt as though the blood had been drained from her body, to her displeasure she found that she still had enough left to blush at the feeling of his arm around her waist. He knelt beside her and his gray eyes bored into hers. She strove to hold his gaze without betraying the clamoring of her heart.

"Your heart is racing," he murmured as he pressed two long, delicate fingers to her throat, "and your hands are freezing," he continued as he clasped his other hand around hers. She flushed even deeper and looked away, furious with herself. Could anything be more mortifying than her helpless adoration for the lord of the house?

He moved those wonderful fingers to her chin and steered her gaze back to his. Her heart began performing grotesque contortions and somersaults.

"I told you not to over-exert yourself," he said in a stern voice, his eyes glinting with the slightest edge of displeasure. "I have no use for a dead protege, Aearis."

It did not reflect terribly well on his lauded powers of perception, reflected Aearis with bitter amusement, that he thought her symptoms purely the result of a taxing medical procedure.

And yet, when he was kneeling beside her and gazing earnestly into her face, she could not hold even a single ill thought of him, and she found her mind occupied instead with how preposterously _lovely _he was. His kindness washed over her like the tides of her home, and his measured voice calmed her restless spirit no matter what crisis plagued them. And after all, was it so preposterous to think that perhaps… they were the only half-elves left in Middle Earth, were they not? They shared a kinship that no other could ever comprehend-the weight of belonging nowhere and everywhere. The constant tearing of the heart. True, they never spoke of such things to each other. But surely, _surely, _he must feel at least some of what she felt. The bone-deep _knowing _of each other.

And as he held that long, loaded gaze Aearis found hope rising in her throat. Maybe this time…

Then he straightened up and ruffled her hair.

"Go, little sister," he said, with a cheerful casualness that belied the quiet shattering of her heart. "Rest. Bathe. I shall see to Faeleth and Saelor." He pressed an affectionate kiss to her forehead, and it burned her to her core.

She left hurriedly and without protest, hoping that the dawn would distract her mind from the sting of Elrond's unwitting rejection. Indeed, the warm summer breeze worked wonders for her mood as she stepped out of the stifling quiet of the healing halls into the fragrant air. Still, her wounded vanity continued to gnaw at her, and she considered joining Bereneth at the training fields to bask in the glowing admiration of young soldiers. Then she remembered the pervasive odor of blood that still lingered in her hair.

_Perhaps a bath first. _

The clearing where their little stone cottage nestled against the mountains was wonderfully secluded. Rarely did anyone, even the most determined pairs of lovers, find the cloister of fine, fragrant trees without a guide. So Aearis thought little of stripping down to her chemise and clambering up the rock face to a ledge behind the modest waterfall. Her fingers intuitively found the slight creases and imperfections in the stone, and she relished the roughness on her fingers, the chilly caress of the spray from the waterfall. Then she dived into the cold, clear pool beneath. The water embraced her like an old lover. The affectionate nibble of the cold brought her mind into sudden focus and she swam down deep, listening to the songs of the rushing falls with an open heart. She flitted about at the bottom of the pool until her lungs began to burn, then she propelled herself upwards and burst through the surface with a deep gasp.

Her skin tingled, and she felt her senses heightened. The warmth, the scents, the songs of the world rushed into her. Most beautiful of those songs, perhaps, was the clear, deep laughter that rang out through the clearing. Aearis smoothed her hair back and looked to the far end of the pool, where a golden man stood, tall and broad-shouldered and drenched in the rays of the rising sun.

She caught her breath only with difficulty. Somehow, even after all these years, the force of Glorfindel's beauty still staggered her. He looked down at her with a smile that could melt the peak of Caradhras, and she felt a smile dawn on her face to meet it.

"Why is it," he asked, raising a brow, "that I so often find you in the process of jumping off something?"

"You have answered your own question there, dear sir. I have found that whenever I fall, you appear as if by magic to catch me. How can I refrain, then, when the temptation is so great?"

He snorted derisively, but she could see that he enjoyed her outrageous flattery nevertheless.

"You don't seem to need much catching," he observed wryly. "I came to see if you wanted to break fast with me, but I see that you are already industriously occupied with fishing for your meal."

She swam to him and leaned her elbows on the ground near his feet, and he crouched to meet her. With no small smugness, she noticed how he flushed as his eyes darted briefly to the soaked, translucent slip that ineffectually covered the swell of her breasts. He was a hero of the First Age, a figure of legend and glory, an elf lord so far above her that she may as well be flirting with Manwe himself, but this tiny morsel of power that she held over him tasted sweet.

"Breakfast sounds lovely!" she exclaimed enthusiastically. She held out a hand and gave him an expectant look, waiting for him to help her out of the pool. He fixed her with a knowing look.

"You cannot possibly expect me to fall for that _again _," he said, eyeing her hand as though she had offered him a poisonous snake.

"Glorfindel," she said, trying to look hurt, "you cannot think I would pull you into the water?"

"You do it _every_ _time._"

"I have not done it for months! Come now, old friend, I have grown beyond such childish antics."

"You will never grow beyond childish antics," he said. "And in truth, I am glad of it." She aimed her prettiest smile at him, widening her eyes for an extra note of imploring helplessness. She felt the first crack start in his resolve. Just one more push.

"Really, My Lord, such suspicion of a lady does not become you. Are you really going to force me through an undignified struggle to lift myself out of the water after I poured all my strength into Faeleth's delivery? Why, what if I tear my chemise and-"

She could almost hear it as his resolve splintered. Of course he knew that she would pull him in. She _always _pulled him in. But the simple fact of a lady asking for his aid was enough to override his common sense. He sighed and extended his hand. Her smile changed instantly from one of doe-eyed innocence to a wide, wicked grin as she seized his enormous, proffered hand with both of hers, braced herself against the rocky edge with her feet, and pulled him under.

* * *

Of course, he could have stopped it if he wanted to. But those were not the rules of their game. The rules were that she asked, and he obliged. So it had always been.

So he toppled obediently headfirst into the water, and the chilly water knocked the breath from him. Aearis had not let go of his hand, and she dived down with him. In the sunlight, she had looked pretty as a flower. Beneath the surface, her beauty was mesmerizing. Light rippled lovingly over her body, and her hair flared out around her, dark and fluid. They stayed down for a long, silent moment before she kicked towards the surface and pulled him with her.

They surfaced together, and she smiled brilliantly at him. The thing nestled in his chest batted at his heart, tearing painfully at it. Its roots had sunk deep over the last several years, and now it invaded his whole body with its thorns and claws and teeth, suffusing him with constant, exquisite agony. Perhaps on some level, Aearis was aware of this vicious infestation, for she delighted in pushing and pulling him, contorting him, flirting and then flitting away like a capricious breeze.

"I did know you were going to do that," he told her in response to the self-satisfaction in her smile.

"Of course you did," she replied. "Imagine how disappointed you would have been if I didn't!"

They circled each other, pursuing and eluding by turns, laughing like lunatics in the early summer sun. She loved to pull him under, baiting him into the depths of the pool until his breath ran out.

Finally, when the sun was high overhead, Aearis's stomach growled loudly and they clambered reluctantly out of the water. Glorfindel averted his eyes as Aearis stretched with a devastating, purring little moan. Even in the summer heat, his skin prickled suddenly with goosebumps and a shiver ran down his spine.

She stood so very close to him. Far closer than propriety dictated for two unmarried elves of opposite sexes. For a wild moment, he wondered what would happen if he reached out to trace the graceful line from the lobe of her ear down her slender neck to her collarbone. Would she pull him in, her lips parting and the delicate pulse in her throat quickening? Or would she shy away as the trust that bound them shattered irreparably?

Then the moment passed, and he remembered that when it came to her, he may as well try to cage a storm between his fingers, and that he was sworn never to try. So instead, he stretched out on the lush, springy grass and they let the sunlight dry them. The rest of the world faded into a phantasmagoria of vivid colors and songs, smeared and mingled into an insensible, befuddling haze. Heated air and heady perfume of wildflowers wrapped around their minds, leaving them languorous and indulgent. But always in that state of drunken euphoria, her presence beside him was so sharp as to be nearly unbearable-almost as unbearable as her absence.

If he looked at her, he would see the golden light contouring every graceful, curving line of her body. His eyes would catch on the shine on her collarbones, the freckles scattered over her cheeks and shoulders, the deep curve of her upper lip. So he kept his eyes on the canopy of leaves as it flickered over the brilliantly blue sky, and tried to let the simple closeness of her be enough.

* * *

She could feel a swirling breeze dancing over her body, teasing as a feather. She could feel the tangible pressure of the summer, sinking deep into her bones and heating her dark hair. She could feel the individual blades of grass against her back, digging into her skin like clutching nails. But most of all, she could feel him beside her, _not _watching her.

It amused and annoyed her, this dedication of his to averting his eyes at the moments that she most wished to be seen. Just another of their little games-catch and release. She rolled over onto her side to look at him speculatively.

Valar, but he was beautiful. He lay on his back with his arms folded up to support his head. His blue silk coat he had laid aside to dry on the grass, allowing her an excellent view of the way his soaked white cotton shirt clung greedily to his torso. His hair, shining like molten gold in the sunlight, fanned out around him in wild waves, and her fingers itched with the desire to run through the tangles, maybe even brush his warm skin in the process.

Perhaps it was the strange, intoxicating air or the heat addling her mind. Perhaps Elrond's indifference had made her more reckless than usual. _Perhaps you just don't have a shred of common sense, _supplied a voice that sounded quite a lot like her mother.

Regardless, she let her hand extend to weave itself into his wonderful golden mane, twisting the bright strands around her fingers experimentally. His eyes remained fixed upwards, but his breath hitched and then released in a long, shuddering sigh. Through the translucent wet cotton, she could see his powerful muscles, so relaxed mere seconds ago, had coiled into a state of high tension. She found that she wanted very much to touch the skin where the cloth was holding so jealously to his body. Her fingers brushed his jaw as she wound a tendril through her fingers, and he shivered violently. She traced the line of his powerful jaw up to his ear.

He sat bolt-upright and turned to face her, hitting her with the full force of his golden eyes, heavy-lidded and darkened by his dilated pupils. With one enormous hand he grasped her wrist, his slim fingers rough with calluses against the soft skin over her racing pulse. He pulled her up and forward, so that she knelt before him, caught helplessly in his mesmeric gaze. Was her skin burning? It felt like it was burning. She listened to his ragged breath and drank him in like wine. He pulled her closer slowly but inexorably, until his lips were but a breath away from hers. The sun had gone suddenly cold-the only heat she could feel was that which radiated from his body, searing her.

"What do you want from me?" he rasped, his voice hoarse and jagged. He searched her face desperately for an answer, but she had none for him. All she knew was that the tension there and then, suspended as they were at an impassable stalemate, was unbearable and delicious as that panicky edge of lingering beneath the water as her air ran out. She wanted to stay in that agony until she died of it.

She nearly screamed with frustration when he released her suddenly, but instead she rocked back onto her heels and fixed her eyes downwards on the grass as he rose to his feet. His hand appeared in her field of view. It was a builder's hand, not an aristocrat's, with its large, broad, calloused palm, long, powerful fingers, and the prominent veins that wound around it. The sight of it threw her into quiet frenzy. She stared at it, unsure if she wanted to slap it away or kiss it. It occurred to her how terribly _hungry _she was. She raised her eyes to look into his face and immediately regretted it. Her head seemed to swim under the power of his beauty.

His hand was still extended to her.

"Come along now, my friend," he said. His voice, which had moments ago been hardly more than a gasp, was calm and musical. It was so deep that she felt it vibrating in her ribcage. "Perhaps a walk will serve to dry us out. You must be hungry by now-if we hurry we can catch the midday meal in the main hall."

She nodded distractedly and allowed him to pull her to her feet. At his amused suggestion, she ducked quickly into the cottage to slip into the first dress she laid her hands on. Even the fluid silk chafed against her over-sensitive skin.

Then she took his arm and they walked together up the hill to Elrond's manor. She told him of the new child, Saelor, and his eyes softened to an expression of unadulterated joy. Elves loved children, but for Glorfindel in particular the news seemed so overwhelming that she imagined that she saw a glimmer of tears in his bright eyes.

"You have done a wonderful thing," he said quietly. His voice was charged with emotion. "Elven children do not come easily into the world, and that which is present at their birth changes their very essence. The force that you gave him will fuel his spirit forever."

Aearis considered that for a moment, and reflected that Noenor might not be pleased if his son began exhibiting signs of imitating her. The counselor had rather a low tolerance for merry chaos. She said as much to Glorfindel and he laughed. Oh, it was a wonderful sound.

"No indeed," he replied, "If Saelor has a quarter of your spirit, he will surely drive his parents quite mad. But sanity is a small price to pay for a joyful and healthy child."

"It is said," Aearis said tentatively, conscious of the dangers of relating idle gossip, but too curious to resist, "that you were born under the boughs of Laurelin. Is that why you are so…" She trailed off and gestured vaguely at him.

"So…?" he prompted teasingly. She searched for words that would adequately describe him, but as far as she could tell no such words existed in Sindarin or Adunaic.

"Blond?" she hazarded. "And… prone to glowing?"

What she really wanted to say was rather more lyrical, but she felt suddenly and inexplicably shy.

"Blond and prone to glowing," he repeated, chuckling heartily. "Now I finally understand why you are held to be the finest young bard in all of Eriador."

She elbowed him lightly and smiled at the contagious rumble of his full-bodied mirth. It was in this way-damp, arm in arm, and laughing-that they entered the main hall.

As usual, Glorfindel's appearance in the room caused a ripple to pass over the assembled elves. The ladies, unattached and otherwise, quickly adjusted their coiffures and bodices, surreptitiously checking their reflections in the cutlery. The gentlemen straightened their posture and squared their shoulders, attempting subconsciously to imitate Glorfindel's casual elegance. Aearis felt the now-familiar scrutiny that fell upon her as his companion-many pairs of eyes raking over her clothes and figure, catching on her wet hair and bare feet.

She made to disentangle from him. True, she was not one to shrink from the center of attention. Still, the collective evaluation of all the elves of Imladris made her feel naked and small, and she despised the sensation of self-consciousness that settled over her. But Glorfindel, with firm and gentle force, pressed his hand over hers and kept it settled upon his arm.

They sat down together at a long table beside the great arched windows at the northern side of the room. Carwegon, a young footman, rushed over to serve them, cheeks flushed from his proximity to the legendary hero of Lindon. Without prompting, he brought them two full roast pheasants, a platter of cheese and cured meat, a bowl of sliced peaches, and a pitcher of strawberry wine.

Aearis set to eating at once with the bare minimum of decorum. Her pheasant vanished within minutes, washed down with generous gulps of the wine, which went to her head almost immediately. Glorfindel ate more slowly, watching her with an expression torn between wonder and amusement.

"I will never tire of watching you eat," he told her as she tore into a succulent leg. "Like witnessing a wolf cub devour its first kill."

She favored him with a predatory smile.

"Careful, Son of Laurelin. If you keep teaching me to fight, you may be next."

"You would have to land a blow on me first," he pointed out lightly. She kicked him under the table.

"There. Now I've landed one. Does that mean your flesh is forfeit?"

"I suppose distraction and opportunism are perfectly viable tactics," he conceded, reaching down to rub his shin absent-mindedly, though her bare feet could hardly have hurt him. "Perhaps if you sit down to a meal with the goblin hordes, they shall flee before your appetites in terror. Or at least accept you as one of their own."

Aearis was far too pleasantly occupied with the tart, juicy peaches to bother taking offense to the comparison, so she contented herself with aiming another kick at his shin under the table. This time he evaded the blow and captured the attacking leg with one of his. It was in the midst of this clandestine struggle that Gimlith and Cestedir found them.

Gimlith had returned that morning from a long scouting mission along the southern border and, from the ink stains that covered her hands, Aearis guessed that she had just finished writing her report.

"We interrupting something?" Cestedir intoned, raising a brow.

"Glorfindel called me an orc!" Aearis piped up at once. "So I retaliated with senseless violence."

"Good girl," said Cestedir approvingly as he and Gimlith sat down across from them.

Gimlith was already searching the room with hungry eyes.

"Where is that footman? I am ravenous_ . _" She spoke more in a growl than in a human voice. "All I have eaten for a fortnight is bloody _lembas. _" She snarled the word with profound distaste.

Glorfindel pushed his untouched pheasant towards her and raised a hand. Instantly, a maid appeared at his shoulder. Fereth was a pretty Silvan, with pale blond hair and enormous green eyes. The golden lord smiled warmly at her, addressing her by name, and requested two more meals. She blushed scarlet to the tips of her ears and scurried off. His companions rolled their eyes in unison at him.

"You should probably go check to make sure her poor heart has not given out from sheer strain, my love," said Gimlith to Aearis, who popped another slice of fruit into her mouth and shrugged.

"I cannot be held responsible for all the casualties of Glorfindel's flirting, mother. It would leave absolutely no time for other pursuits. He is utterly indiscriminate."

"That is quite a bold statement coming from you," said a quiet, amused voice behind them. Aearis turned to smile at Bereneth, who stood behind her still dressed in the dark cloak and muddy road boots of a sentinel.

"Oh hullo," she said. "Did you return early from your patrol just to disagree with me?"

"Not entirely. I thought perhaps you would like to go out on that herb-gathering expedition today." Her manner was casual, but Aearis detected an edge behind Bereneth's customary studied calm. She finished her goblet of wine in one swig and stood.

"Will you not eat, Bereneth?" asked Glorfindel, glancing between the two girls in some confusion at their sudden departure. "If you are willing to wait, I can join you on your outing presently."

"Oh, there is no need for that," Aearis assured him as she and Bereneth backed out of the room. "We have much gossip to discuss, and much of it concerns you."

Once they had escaped the main hall and made towards the stables where their horses were saddled, she gave herself leave to examine her friend more thoroughly. Bereneth looked pale and drawn, and her hands were trembling.

"How is she?" Aearis kept her voice low, though they were quite alone.

"Worse," sighed Bereneth, raking one unsteady hand through her hair. "She can scarcely stand for the swelling in her legs."

Aearis was overwhelmed by a surge of pity, more for Bereneth than Runhilde. To be left behind, forced to watch as the ravages of age laid waste to the body of a loved one… she cut off her thoughts and shuddered.

They stopped only for Aearis to gather the small stash of medicines that she had slowly accumulated over the years. Then they set off southwards. Despite the heat of the early summer air, Aearis felt cold to her bones.

* * *

They watched the girls depart hurriedly with collective consternation.

"So," said Glorfindel at last, "where do we think they are _really _going?"

Gimlith scoffed and rolled her eyes.

"I do wish they would at least use less tired lies," she said, cutting into her pheasant with gusto. "It is bad enough that they lie to us, but must they insult our intelligence as well? _Herb gathering _my foot."

"Let them have their secrets, my dear," said Cestedir gently. "They are grown now, and we cannot expect them to tell us everything as they used to."

He received a dark look from his wife.

"Easy for you to say," she retorted. "You _know _where they disappear to twice or thrice a month _. _"

Glorfindel looked at Cestedir in surprise.

"Do you?" he asked, hoping that he did not seem too disconcerted. Surely Aearis would trust him with anything she would to Cestedir.

"Bereneth wanted my advice," said the rough captain by way of explanation. "And it is not my secret to tell. Suffice it to say that they are not subjecting themselves to more than usual amounts of danger."

Hardly reassuring, given the usual amount of danger that Aearis was accustomed to pursuing.

Their conversation was halted by the arrival of yet another. Ruineth, who had been seated with several of the other dignitaries of Elrond's house, addressed them with an elegant curtsey. She looked exceptionally lovely that day in diaphanous white, with her red hair loose and lightly adorned around her delicate face.

"Lord Glorfindel," she murmured, casting her eyes downwards. "Captain Cestedir. Lady Gimlith, it is a pleasure to see you returned safely." Gimlith's expression suggested that she very much doubted this to be the case.

"I am sure," she replied politely, but to Glorfindel's trained ear the words dripped with sarcasm. If she noticed, Ruineth made no sign of it.

"I had the privilege," continued the counsellor, "of reading your recommendations concerning diplomatic relations with the corsairs of Belfalas." There was the most understated note of distaste in her expression. "I confess, I have never had the fortune of encountering such a… courageous position among the counsellors of Imladris."

"You must be mistaken, Counsellor Galoriel*," replied Gimlith, with a hint of inflection on her father-name, which made delicate reference to Ruineth's family station. It was a low blow and, from the coloring of Ruineth's cheeks, she felt it keenly. "My report clearly delineated the differences between the corsairs whose terrain is to the south in the vicinity of Umbar and the Numenorean settlements that remain faithful to the Valar. You must be thinking of some other treatise. Or perhaps a novel?"

Ruineth bristled visibly. When she spoke again, it was with less composure.

"Forgive my forgetfulness, my lady," she gritted out. "But from the perspective of _my _people, all the children of Numenor seem much alike in both countenance and behavior."

Cestedir's eyes were darting between the women with mingled interest and discomfort. For his part, Glorfindel had always known that the two women were frequently at odds over matters of policy, but this sort of covert warfare left a bitter taste in his mouth.

"Indeed!" he cut in as Gimlith made to reply. "I suppose we, all of us, have a bit of the pirate in us. Do you not think so, Cestedir? Why, just the other day I found myself moved to clench a dagger between my teeth and climb the village walls!"

Ruineth murmured a polite response and curtseyed again, but this time the gesture was rather stiff. As she left, she turned her head to meet Glorfindel's eyes. Her gaze was eloquent.

"Shall I see you at the Hall of Fire tonight, my lord?" she asked, her voice sweet and solicitous. Glorfindel smiled at her and inclined his head, and she rejoined her table. Then he turned a reproachful look on Gimlith, who met it with indifference.

"That was unkind," he pointed out unnecessarily.

"Good. It was meant to be," she retorted. Glorfindel sighed. Sometimes he forgot that, though wise and clever, Gimlith was only one hundred and seventy years old.

"There was no need to insult her birth," Cestedir chimed in. "That was beneath you."

"Nor was there a need to name my people as corsairs." Gimlith's voice was hard with cold fury. "Lord Elrond's council is plagued by supercilious cowards who look upon the race of Men with indiscriminate condescension. I will not abide it."

"And I am sure," replied Cestedir quietly, "that this exchange did wonders for Counsellor Ruineth's opinion of Men."

They were saved from Gimlith's reply by the return of Fereth, the maid, who brought them a silver platter with a beautiful, airy cake. Glorfindel grinned at her and kissed her hand, and the girl squeaked and scurried, red-faced, back to the kitchens.

"Really, Glorfindel," started Cestedir, when Fereth was gone, "this is absurd. Must you make all the women in the valley fall in love with you?"

"Not all!" protested Glorfindel. "For no matter how I try to charm her away, Gimlith still seems unaccountably devoted to you."

"Utterly indiscriminate," Gimlith repeated, shaking her head.

"What you need, my boy," said Cestedir, "is a bloody good jilting. A bit of heartbreak would be damned good for you in my opinion." Gimlith nodded in agreement, but Cestedir was not done speaking. "Why not Aearis? She would lead you on a merry chase before turning around and shattering you."

Both Glorfindel and Gimlith choked on their mouthfuls of cake. By sheer determination, Gimlith was first to recover.

"Husband," she said in a low, dangerous voice, "think _very carefully _about what you say next."

Cestedir shrugged, perfectly unconcerned with the daggers shooting from Gimlith's eyes.

"She's not a child anymore, Gimlith. Or have you not noticed the young gentlemen who sneak out by her balcony every morning?"

"Cestedir," Glorfindel pleaded, feeling exceptionally hot under the collar. "Please, that is enough."

The captain must have seen something compelling in his friend's eyes, because he desisted immediately.

"Oh alright, alright," he said in a conciliatory tone. "I was just teasing."

Glorfindel stood very suddenly, startling even himself.

"I should go," he muttered, very conscious that his face must be a brilliant shade of red.

The hot, humid air outside brought him no relief from the fire burning under his skin. He felt her keenly, running through his bloodstream like a fever.

* * *

When Glorfindel had hurried away, Cestedir turned to his wife with an expression of deep satisfaction.

"You see?" he said, rather gleefully. "What did I tell you? He is mad about her."

Gimlith scowled and finished off the second pitcher of strawberry wine, grimacing at the sweetness of it.

"I don't like it," she muttered finally, glaring at her gold-rimmed goblet. "He is too old for her." She rolled her eyes at the incredulous look Cestedir gave her. "It is not the same for us," she snapped in response to his unspoken point. "We met when I was a grown woman, as equals."

"Gimlith, light of my life, our people live for far too long to be fussy about age differences," Cestedir said gently. "Many elves marry partners whom they knew as children. It is unavoidable."

"She is too young."

"She is fully grown, and has been so for some time now. Perhaps it is time you accept that." To this Gimlith replied with a dark look.

"I don't like it," she repeated mulishly.

"Oh come now," he cried, a touch of exasperation entering his tone. "What's not to like? Even leaving aside all that "reincarnated hero of the people" business, he is brave, kind, and honorable, and has shown time and time again that nothing matters more to him than Aearis's happiness. What more can you ask of a suitor, Gimlith? Would Ulmo himself suffice?"

Gimlith dug aggressively into the cake with her fork, and did not answer until she had swallowed several more mouthfuls.

"It is impossible to leave all that "hero business" aside," she said finally. She no longer looked angry. Just tired. "She is too young, too confused, to hold her own against him. He has been her protector, her champion, her light in dark places, since she was a girl. How could she ever hope to resist his will? Her freedom, her Choice, her human blood… he would take it all from her without even realizing it. I will not have her subsumed."

"Are we talking about the same people?" replied Cestedir, genuinely confused. "You have seen them together, surely. She is not the one that needs worrying about."

"Not yet," said Gimlith grimly, her eyes faraway. "Of course it starts so, with moon-eyed devotion and sweet words. But what happens after the magic has worn away? Do you expect me to believe that the Hero of Gondolin would accept it if his beloved chose a different fate? Do you think elven society would accept it? You see how they look at her when she walks with him-every motion, every choice they shall scrutinize and critique until nothing remains of her but a shadow that walks behind her husband." She lapsed into silence long enough to eat more cake.

"He is not Glirron."

Cestedir said it quietly and without any edge to his voice, but Gimlith flinched back as though he had hit her. Her eyes were burning.

"Glirron was not Glirron either, at the beginning." she hissed, seething. "We cannot know how Glorfindel would bear her burden. And," she added, picking up momentum, "he made an oath. An oath to protect her freedom at any cost. He cannot do that as her husband."

He drummed his fingers on the table, agitated despite himself. That oath had been a terrible idea from the start, and he bitterly regretted sitting by passively when Glorfindel made it.

"And Valar know, damned Noldo that he is, he will keep to that cursed oath until it kills them both," he answered, unable to keep an edge of anger out his voice. Instinctively, Gimlith reached out a hand to grasp his. They disagreed often, and always had, but never with enough aggression to prevent them from sharing gentle moments. The tension lessened slightly and he squeezed her fingers in return. Even in the hot summer air, her hands were very cold.

"I cannot stop them if it is their will to be united," she sighed, and the weariness that had been temporarily burned away by her anger descended once again upon her shoulders. "But they would be fools to rush in now when all of time stretches before them."

"Lucky that neither of them have _ever _been described as fools," Cestedir said lightly. Gimlith just smiled and returned her attention to the cake. He waited a few minutes, revelling in the tranquility. Then he decided to try something foolhardy. He gestured for Fereth to bring more wine, which she did promptly. Better to try this while she had a full goblet in front of her. "Gimlith," he said while she washed down a particularly large portion of cake with a gulp of wine. "Release him from the oath. Please."

With her mouth full, she had to pause and swallow before she spoke. During this brief moment of forced introspection, Cestedir saw her dark eyes soften from flashing to merely glittering.

"And why would I do that?" she asked with deadly calm.

"Because Aearis is more than able to take care of her own freedom. Because he loves her. Because I think that, if she does not already love him, she very easily could. Because total freedom is lonelier than you could possibly imagine. And because, again, Noldor vows are _bloody terrifying. _"

Gimlith scrutinized him with fathomless eyes, and he felt himself starting to sweat. _Fuck it's hot. _

"No." Her voice was so level that even he could find no trace of emotion in it. The silence stretched between them for a time, Cestedir staring blindly out the window, Gimlith industriously annihilating the remaining cheese, until she spoke again. "Not yet. Not for a long time. But you are right. Someday, I hope, Azruari will be strong enough to protect her own freedom, and may choose to stay beside him willingly. But not now. Not for a thousand years at least."

"My dear," said Cestedir cautiously, struggling to find tactful phrasing, "I hope you do not think me insensitive... but, as I believe I have heard you mention on occasion, you are rather unlikely to be here in a thousand years to release him."

She smirked at him.

"Indeed, I will not. So I shall deputize you to choose the moment to release him from that obligation."

He stared at her in horror.

"I want no part of this," he insisted. "I have no interest in entangling myself with you mad aristocrats and your vows. Apart from _that _kind of entanglement," he conceded in response to her suggestive little smile. Her eyes kept boring into him until, suddenly, he buckled. "Fine!" he cried. "I shall carry this bloody oath until… until when? How do I know when she reaches this mystical point of readiness?"

"When she returns to him by her own will," said Gimlith simply, as though it were painfully obvious.

"Oh, right. Of course. I shall just drop everything and wait around for that, shall I?"

She smiled and leaned in to press a tender kiss to his temple.

"That, my dear, is parenthood," she said. "Now come, husband," she commanded in approximately the same voice she used to marshal her soldiers. "I have spent the last two weeks sleeping alone, and real food was not the only thing I missed. And I happen to have it on good intelligence that our lovely daughters have vacated the house for… herb gathering." Cestedir's eyes widened as she took his hand and pulled him up, dragging him towards the door with surprising force. Dazed and not entirely sure what had just happened, he willingly followed his wife into the summer heat.

* * *

**Author's note:**

*Daughter of the Grower

Small character note: So, I thought hard about this, because I like Gimlith and I generally want to think well of her. But I'm also pretty sure that Numenoreans with their bloodlines and their noble houses and such would be pretty damn classist. And on top of that, she is exceptionally proud, so an elven woman of low birth who insults the race of Men is pretty much guaranteed to bring out her ugly side. I imagine her a lot like Denethor: generally wise and brave, but very used to getting her way.

As an aside, the only character that I associate with a real, existing person is Cestedir, who I imagine to be pretty similar in face and mannerisms to Alan Tudyk. I don't want to ruin anyone's mental picture of him, because that is by no means the only way of visualizing him, but I mention it because I found myself impersonating Tudyk a lot while writing this chapter.

Also, thank you to my reviewers! It's so encouraging to hear that this story is being enjoyed by people other than me! I'm now almost caught up on , so hopefully chapter 13 will go up on here at the same time as on AO3.


	12. A Thousand Cuts

**Trigger warning:** I just wanted to alert readers that this chapters has heavy elements of severe illness, including descriptions of sickle cell anemia and stroke. I welcome any discussion of these conditions via comment or message, including critique of my depiction.

* * *

"His life was gentle; and the elements

So mixed in him, that Nature might stand up

And say to all the world, THIS WAS A MAN!"

― **William Shakespeare, ****_Julius Caesar_**

_Summer 2880 SA, Imladris _

Over the course of that beautiful summer, Runhilde's health continued to deteriorate. She was now in her mid fifties-a handsome woman with a full figure and deep, beautiful eyes. Bereneth and Aearis rode often to Swallow's Rest, growing increasingly careless with their concealment of their true purpose. There, Bereneth would pace restively in the hallway while Aearis attended to her patient.

There was no obvious reason that Runhilde was dying. She had simply begun to weaken slowly, succumbing easily to infection. There was something silently killing her, and Aearis drove herself near madness in her desperate attempts to coax the secret from Runhilde's body. Finally, she stumbled upon it. Desperate, she had snuck a sample of Runhilde's blood into the healing halls to examine it under the marvelous magnifying lenses that Elrond had commissioned from the finest glass artisans in Eriador. She lit the laboratory as well as she could with gas lamps that burned bright and constantly, and painted Runhilde's blood upon a thin film of glass.

For at least an hour, she gazed at the sample, unable to quite believe her own eyes. She pricked her own finger and shed a drop on another film, then stared at that instead.

Runhilde's blood was simply _different. _Instead of the rounded particles that she saw in her own sample, Runhilde's appeared to be teeming with thousands of little daggers, curved like the crescent moon and cruel-looking. Aearis shuddered as she stared at it.

"Something the matter?" She jumped out of her skin at the sound of the gentle voice behind her, nearly shattering the magnifying array and the samples. Behind her, Elrond sighed.

"Aearis, it is well past midnight. And what have I said about working alone in the laboratory?" He sounded more resigned than reproachful. Then he noticed the tears burning her eyes. "What happened?" he asked urgently. "Are you unwell?"

Hands trembling, Aearis showed him the samples. He examined them silently for a time, then turned to look at her.

"Whose blood is this?" he asked with a heavy sadness in his voice.

"She-" Aearis stopped speaking abruptly, aware that she could not betray Bereneth's confidence even now. So, she explained her secretive trips to Swallow's Rest, her longing for the company of the race of Men. Then, seamlessly, she began to lie. She described her friendship with Runhilde, mentioned in passing that she had asked Bereneth to begin escorting her to and from the Mannish village for the sake of safety. Elrond listened in his patient way, his eyes brimming with compassion.

For the first time, Aearis hated how easily the lies dripped from her tongue like sweetened poison. Hated how much he trusted every word that came out of her mouth. Hated how easily she could write Bereneth out of a story that should have belonged to her.

At that moment, she hated everything: Elrond's kindness, Bereneth's naked heart, her own silver-tongued deceptions, and, most of all, the legion of vicious swords that ran through Runhilde's bloodstream, cutting her to ribbons from within.

"Is there anything?" she choked out, once she had finished spinning the tale for Elrond. "Anything at all that we can do?"

In truth, she had never felt much kinship with Runhilde. The woman had always regarded her with a kind of cool appraisal. Not dislike, precisely, but disapproval. She felt guilty every time the mortal pinned her down with those dark eyes of hers. But now she felt as if her very sanity depended upon his answer.

"Nothing to save her," Elrond replied, his gray eyes flickering with unshed tears. "Only to ease her pain. We cannot change the nature of her blood."

The next time they rode to Swallow's Rest, Elrond rode with them. He greeted the mortal woman in her own language, and conversed with her of the loveliness of her home, the books upon her shelves, the methods of her work. Aearis felt his sweetness in her own breast with a sort of aching gratitude. Though he had always been beautiful, now he appeared to her so lovely that she could feel it like agony in her bones.

He administered several remedies while he stayed with her, mostly for palliative care. Something had broken in Runhilde's body, silently and without trace, but now, he said in hushed tones to Bereneth and Aearis, it was only a matter of time until her body succumbed to the strain it had borne so steadily for the entirety of Runhilde's short life. Aearis did not look at Bereneth, but she could feel the shaking of her friend's hands as if they were her own.

Aearis, Bereneth, and Elrond returned from Swallow's Rest in total silence. Elrond rode in front, but to Aearis's annoyance, he often glanced back to shoot her sympathetic glances. Normally she might have enjoyed the attentiveness, but the deceptions weighed heavy on her, and she found herself chafing under his worried gaze.

Bereneth rode in back, still and quiet. It was not in her nature to bellow her anger to the heavens, to curse the Valar and salt the earth with her overpowering grief. No, patience and gentility shrouded her pain, leaving only her silent, neverending scream that resonated in Aearis's body in ever greater waves.

They never spoke of Runhilde to each other, except to exchange information regarding her treatment. There was nothing else that could be captured by words.

Aearis was no stranger to human illnesses, and she found little difficulty in suppressing the sympathetic ache in her breast until it had retreated to occupy only a remote, insignificant corner of her heart. She allowed no thought of the fate of Men even to pass her mind, much less mar the bright smiles she bestowed upon her admirers. Indeed, so lively and joyful was she that summer that-though she was not as pale and tall as Bereneth, nor as delicate and elegant as Ruineth-Aearis accumulated so many sighing paramours that Gimlith found it necessary to acquire an immense, intimidating black hound from Elrond's beastmaster.

"I will not have your young men swooning about the house," she reminded Aearis frequently. "Keep them in your room or Dinalagos shall devour them."

Gimlith had chosen the great hound particularly for his vicious aspect-he stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Bereneth, with glowing yellow eyes, a thick snarling snout and teeth as long as her index finger. There was even rumor among the elves of Imladris that his sire had been a warg. But as far as anyone could tell, Dinalagos showed little interest in anything save sleeping and the occasional scratch behind his ears or on his gently expanding belly, for Aearis kept him so well-fed with table scraps that he saw little need for hunting anything-even suitors.

Only in the nights was Aearis forced to confront that dark little corner, when she and Elrond retreated to the laboratory and slaved over their lenses and solutions. But even then, Aearis thought little of Runhilde, or Bereneth, or of the faraway memories that hissed and whispered in the back of her mind. She thought of blood and herbs and symptoms, and the endless scream faded into the background until she could hardly hear it all.

And, slowly, Runhilde seemed to improve. Her breath came more easily, her eyes were clear and bright, and she moved again as she did when she was twenty. Elrond and Aearis rejoiced at their success, and her heart fluttered whenever he clasped her hands or swept her into a friendly embrace.

So, life flowed on in the vale, so merry and pleasant that there was little reason to think of the jagged edges beneath the silk and lace.

* * *

_Three weeks before midsummer _

Glorfindel cursed as he scanned the clearing for his opponent. Dusk had fallen sudden and heavy over the valley, and now the shadows sheltered his target, whispering taunts and misdirections. Then, like a ghost on his skin, he felt her behind him. Her hand passed within a hair of his ribs as he turned and dodged, but when he moved to counterstrike she had vanished again. Then the palm of her other hand, apparently out of thin air, smashed into his chin and sent him reeling backwards just as she swept behind his knee and sent him toppling backwards. As he fell, he caught the wrist of her right hand and rotated them so that she fell beneath him with her own dagger pressed to her throat.

Shrouded as she was in the twilight, he could hardly make out her features. Only the sparkle in her eyes identified her

"A pretty trick," he observed dryly as they lay upon the grass together. "It might have worked if you had backed away immediately rather than staying to gloat over me."

Even in the pressing darkness, he could see her roll her eyes.

"Only you would lecture so when you have one of the most eligible ladies of Imladris pinned beneath you," she said, twisting enough to make him very keenly aware of every curve of her body. Pressed against her pulse, Echiar was like a direct conduit to her bloodstream, and Glorfindel could feel her elevated heartbeat reverberating through the blade.

He released her quickly, jumping to his feet and helping her up after him. The shades had retreated from her now, and she stood in full relief under the gray light. She looked beautiful. And smug.

"Only you," he returned, "would taunt a warrior with a knife to your throat."

There was a moment of perfect silence, the kind of silence that could only be felt in the first hush of evening. It was deep, and penetrating, and heady, and it left Glorfindel slightly breathless. It was becoming an acute kind of torment conducting these training sessions, especially as Aearis seemed to delight in exercising her power over him.

She drew nearer to him, so near that he held his breath for fear of frightening her away. He could feel the warmth of her skin mere centimeters from his, and his fingers burned where they hung loosely at his side. She came so very easily to him, but she retreated more easily still. So, frozen in the warm evening, he watched as she plucked a few clovers out of his hair. Then she danced away again, and he followed. What else could he do?

They parted ways to change for dinner, and Glorfindel, still slightly disoriented, promised to meet her at the cottage and escort her to the main hall.

When he returned to that peaceful clearing, night had fallen in earnest. The waterfall shone silver under the waning moon, and even the little stone cottage seemed to glow faintly. To his great pleasure, the house had taken on a life of its own in his forty-year absence. Cestedir had plastered the walls and painted them with jewel-bright frescos of rolling waves, golden shores, great white sea-birds, and broadly-branching trees with graceful green leaves and small clusters of golden flowers.

Glorfindel let himself in and awaited his fair companion in the kitchen. It was well-stocked with fat peaches and tender apricots, hanging legs of cured pork, as well as a wide assortment of cheeses and a basket of mushrooms. Many-faceted crystal lamps bathed the house in a warm golden glow and cast slivers of colored light over the walls. He settled at the large kitchen table that he himself had crafted from pale maple wood, carved painstakingly with flowering vines that climbed from the floor to support the tabletop.

His mind wandered inconveniently, conjuring the ghosts of her curving, parted lips, her hips pinned beneath his, her eyes tempting and taunting him to madness. Then he yanked himself back, searching desperately for some other subject to occupy his thoughts. He found his problem temporarily solved when he heard the front door slam shut and Gimlith, clad in a suit of light mail and looking rather exhausted, tramped unceremoniously into the kitchen. She looked him up and down, noting the bruise starting under his chin.

"Really, Glorfindel, don't you know not to fight Aearis after sunset?" He shrugged and gave her a helpless smile.

"She is very persuasive," he said. Gimlith grimaced.

"I fear it has rather ruined her disposition. No one ever seems to say no to her." At this, Gimlith fixed him with a piercing, slightly accusing stare. "It will not serve her well, you know."

He shifted uncomfortably and cast around for a change in topic. Though Gimlith had never raised any direct objections to his odd, ill-defined friendship with her daughter, he knew perfectly well that the steely, sharp-eyed woman disapproved of the way he cosseted Aearis. True, he did not haunt her footsteps like a love-struck puppy the way her many young, smitten suitors did. Nor did he shelter her, as Cestedir and Elrond were often inclined to do; in their combat training sessions he had forced himself to strike her just as hard as he did the soldiers he trained for the Imladris patrols, leaving her with the same bruises on her body and her pride. But when he met Gimlith's eyes, he was so often reminded of that iron-clad oath from so long ago. That never would he allow her to be shackled. Not even to him.

"Did you find much trouble on the roads?" he asked finally, slightly awkwardly. Though Gimlith was now a woman rather beyond middle-age even in the reckoning of her long-lived line, her quick, deadly skill in combat remained and her energy never seemed to flag. Her dark hair was now generously streaked with silver and her beautiful face was lined both with worry and with laughter, but she stood straight and strong as ever and her eyes shone with the same keen edge. Her presence in the Imladris patrols had greatly improved the discipline and organization of the company, for her ruthless, strategic mind and iron will brought much-needed cohesion to the mixed Silvan, Sindarin, and Elda troops.

But as she opened her mouth to answer his question, a dark pall passed over her face and her eyes clouded over. She put out a hand to steady herself against one brilliantly painted wall, for her knees wobbled and began to give. The other flew to her mouth to stifle a silent cough that nevertheless sent shocks through her whole body. Glorfindel leapt to his feet in alarm and rushed to her side, but by the time he had reached her, the bout had passed and she stood as straight as ever. The only remaining trace of the alarming episode was a new tension in her shoulders and a smear of red on the hand that she lowered from her mouth.

"Gimlith, what-" he started, bewildered. But she pursed her lips and shook her head.

_Not a word, _said her black gaze.

Gimlith's eyes flickered to the door as they heard Aearis returning down the stairs. In a flash, Gimlith had seized a paring knife and picked up a juicy red peach from the basket on the kitchen table. She made a motion as if to cut the fruit, but moved the knife so that it bit instead into the palm of her left hand just as her daughter entered, clad in a lovely, iridescent dress that traced the line of her collarbone and clung reverently to her slender waist. Even as she turned to smile at Glorfindel, her nose twitched and her head snapped around to stare at Gimlith.

"Mother, you're back!" There was pleasure in her voice, but it was laced with suspicion. "Why do I smell fresh blood?"

Gimlith smiled easily and displayed her newly bleeding palm with an apologetic shrug.

"Imagine the bad luck! I return from dismantling an entire bandit camp unscathed, then immediately cut my hand slicing a damned fruit."

Aearis relaxed and laughed lightly, before taking a position beside her mother's chair and checking her over efficiently for other injuries.

"Could you fetch my medical kit from my room, Glorfindel?" she requested, not looking up from her task. "It should be scattered about my desk. I need my tincture of turmeric and blueblade grass and my stitching set. Oh! And bandages, of course."

Glorfindel found the supplies quickly enough, though Aearis's room was so littered with books, parchment, instruments, and bundles of loose herbs that his task proved far more difficult than he could have expected. But he paused a while upstairs to collect himself from the strange encounter in the kitchen. It was clear to him that this was not the first episode that Gimlith had concealed. Her reaction had been too smooth, too practiced. And the buckling of the knees, the clouding of her piercing gaze, the deep, spasmodic coughs-though he had little experience of the ailments of mortals, Glorfindel knew enough to worry.

By the time he returned to the lower landing, Gimlith had succeeded in distracting Aearis. The two women were conversing rapidly in Adunaic. Glorfindel hesitated in the hallway. He had long since learned to understand the rich, sensuous language simply by proximity to the two quarrelsome Numenoreans-a facility for language was, after all, his birthright as a Noldo. But it had always seemed unpardonably forward and invasive to reveal this to Aearis or Gimlith, who retreated to Adunaic when they felt especially alien in the lands of the Sindar. So, over the years he had found himself the unintentional audience of the private world that existed only between mother and daughter. The arguments, the inside jokes, the reminiscences. Sometimes he found his heart aching with nostalgia for a land he had never seen. But now their discussion was of a different sort. One that he very much wished he could not understand.

"... you tease him too much, little rogue. He is too honest for your games-he cannot separate youthful high spirits from true intention."

"Oh please," scoffed Aearis, "we are speaking of the most powerful, universally adored warrior alive in Middle Earth. I doubt a bit of light flirtation will turn his head."

"Heed me, Azruari: do not begin something you haven't the spine to finish. If you are not willing to give him everything, stop treating him like a pretty ribbon to be wrapped idly around your little finger."

"You overestimate me, mother. I could not break his heart if I tried."

Glorfindel could bear no more, so he stepped into the kitchen as casually as he could. Aearis had stanched the bleeding of her mother's hand and cut the offending fruit into glistening, appetizing wedges.

Aearis's cheeks were slightly flushed, presumably from the discussion he had interrupted, and Gimlith's expression as she scrutinized him was pensive and a little too discerning. When he set the supplies beside her, she set to work cleaning and bandaging the cut, as well as swabbing several other, smaller cuts that Gimlith had accumulated in the wilds, with the absent-minded efficiency of long practice. He maintained an expression of practiced neutrality as he addressed them.

"It gives me great sorrow to bring you ill news, my lady, but it appears that a hurricane has devastated your quarters."

"Hurricane is one word for it," muttered Gimlith darkly. "Wanton carelessness is another."

"That's two words, mother," Aearis corrected her, cheerfully. "Now, shall we away to that meal you promised me?" Dutifully, he offered his arm, but before she could take it, Gimlith held up her hand.

"You go on, daughter of mine. I have some matters of security to discuss with Glorfindel. He shall join you presently."

Aearis shot a speculative look between them, but she obeyed without argument. It was a true marvel that, stubborn and argumentative as she was, she had never been known to flout a direct order from her mother. As she fluttered out of the cottage, she passed Cestedir, who tottered under a tall stack of maps and schematics.

"I see that Aearis baited you into sparring after sunset," he observed, glancing at the bruises on Glorfindel's face. His eyes had turned to his wife before Glorfindel could respond, and immediately his smile dropped and he dropped his files carelessly as he hastened to kneel beside her. "Gimlith, did it happen again?"

Glorfindel wondered at the unexpected perceptiveness of the generally unrefined old soldier. If he had not been present during the bout, Glorfindel would never have known anything was amiss from Gimlith's demeanor. But then, perhaps it was some strange magic of bonded couples; certainly Glorfindel would not know of such things.

"How could you know that?" he asked before he could stop himself, regarding his old friend with some amazement.

Cestedir smiled despite the deep furrow in his brow.

"Well, for one, you were looking at her the way you might look at a mutilated corpse. You do realize that everything shows on your face, don't you?"

"Thank the Valier that my daughter is too self-absorbed to have noticed," muttered Gimlith in agreement. "I thought you would certainly give me away with that pale tragic look that you-oh, for goodness sake, yes, _that one. _"

"But more obviously," continued Cestedir as Glorfindel self-consciously tried to correct his face, "since Aearis has an uncanny sense of smell for anything concerning ailments or injuries, Gimlith has resorted to the absolutely preposterous measure of acquiring small cuts to cover when she coughs up blood_._"

Gimlith glared at her husband, though she could not muster quite enough energy to give the look its usual razor edge.

"She deserves to know, Gimlith," Glorfindel said quietly. She turned her flashing gaze on him instead, and it was all he could do not to step back under the force of it.

"You will tell her _nothing _," she snarled, half rising out of her seat before lapsing back into another coughing fit. This bout lasted longer, and it shook her whole frame so violently that Cestedir had to prevent her from falling out of her chair. Finally she shuddered to silence and rested her head in her hands, shoulders slumped forward in an attitude that looked horribly like defeat.

"The girls cannot know," she said after a long, tense silence. "Azruari would lose her mind and Bereneth has enough troubles without shouldering this burden as well."

"They will not thank you for keeping this from them."

She did not raise her head, but he could read the tension etched in every line of her body.

"Azruari has already watched my health fail once. She drove herself out of her senses trying to save me when she was only a child. And she succeeded in the end. But this time is different. It feels so, so different." With great effort, Gimlith raised her head. Glorfindel reeled at the utter exhaustion that he saw in her face. "I am dying, Glorfindel. Not today, not tomorrow, but sooner than I should."

"Perhaps Elrond-"

"We spoke to Elrond," interrupted Cestedir. His expression was extraordinarily, unaccountably calm. "Years ago. He has helped manage the symptoms, but he never expected Gimlith to live this long."

"_ Years. _" The word came out as a gasp. He felt winded, dazed. "You have known for years?" He tried not to sound accusatory, but from the expression on their faces, he had not succeeded. Cestedir looked sad and regretful. Gimlith's eyes were hard and flinty, her jaw set.

"Since before the wedding," Cestedir said, his voice full of unspoken apology. "It's part of the reason we worked so hard to get you to stay. There was no way of knowing how long until…" he trailed off, clearly unable to say the words. "We thought it might be easier on the girls if you were here."

Glorfindel sank into a chair as a wave of jumbled emotions crashed over him with physical force. Anger hit first, hot and insistent. Then, following close upon anger's heels, fear. He stared at Gimlith as though he had never seen her before. Oh, of course he had known she was mortal in small ways. That out on patrols she required more sleep, more food, more rests than the elven soldiers. That she slept with her eyes shut. _Like the dead, _said an unwelcome voice in his mind. But to die? It seemed so unlike Gimlith to surrender even to death itself, to depart with unfinished business.

He studied the silver in her hair with barely controlled resentment. Previously he had always rather liked the lines on her face. They told the story of her life, kept count of her smiles and frowns. But now he found that he hated them. Hated every sign of mortality, every reminder of the goodbyes that were to come.

How _dare _she? The question rang through his mind again and again, but he could not think clearly enough to decide what it was that he resented her for. For the concealment? No, even through the mental fog, he could not begrudge a proud warrior her privacy. For her mortality? But surely, he had always known that she would one day die. For the sadness in Cestedir's eyes? He had chosen his own fate, had he not?

But he was seething, burning, panicking. He thought of Aearis, lively and blooming and so very alone, walking the knife's blade of the Half-Elven, and he was furious with her as well. To dance into his life, make it impossible not to love her, then to escape beyond his reach. It was unbearably cruel, to be kind and beautiful and fleeting.

"I told you he would take it this way," said Gimlith. She spoke to her husband, but her gaze was locked with Glorfindel's. She seemed both bitterly disappointed and perversely satisfied, as though some unhappy prediction had been vindicated.

"What do you expect me to do with this?" he ground out between clenched teeth. Cestedir rose from his place by Gimlith to rest a hand on Glorfindel's arm.

"Just hold it for a little while, my friend," he replied sadly. "Give us this summer of joy before the truth comes out."

Glorfindel stared blindly at Aearis's medical satchel and the paring knife that sat innocently beside it.

"I cannot lie to her," he said, more to himself than to anyone else.

"You have no choice." Gimlith's voice was even and devoid of feeling. "If she knows that I am ill, she will abandon everything else to look after me. She will enslave herself to the care of a dying old woman, and she will fade with me."

For the first time in many years, Glorfindel felt his oath like a manacle as Gimlith yanked it cruelly. He shuddered at the sensation of a battle within his body, the cruel bramble in his breast struggling with the chain binding him hand, foot, and throat.

"You have my word," he choked out. "Die in silence, then, if that is your wish. I want no part of this."

He strode out into the humid night air, seeking relief from the glimmer of the stars and the whispers of the leaves. But everywhere he turned, the songs of the earth cut him with sharp tongues and vicious mockery, and the rippling night took the form of a girl who twirled always just out of his reach.

* * *

Swallow's Rest was quiet in the summer, for all the songbirds had long since returned to their homes in the north, and the heat of the tyrant sun kept the villagers mostly indoors. But the workshop of Runhilde was ever alive with the ringing voice of silver as it was heated and poured, molded and hammered. There had been a time when Aearis had quite liked the song of silver, and she had spent many hours watching Runhilde's apprentices in their work, accompanying them with melodies on a small flute that they had created just for her.

It was a beautiful instrument, though extraordinarily small and simple. It echoed the bright, twinkling sounds of the workshop, and responded to variations in her breath with delightful sensitivity.

But now the silver sang no more, for the mistress of the house rarely graced the shop with her skillful touch, and the apprentices worked in moody, mournful drudgery. Aearis found herself greeted only with somber nods and dull eyes rather than the customary flattering fanfare. She climbed the stairs to Runhilde's bedchamber with mounting apprehension, for the shadows crept out of their corners to drive the sunlight away, and the wooden slats groaned and wept. The whole house seemed to cry out in despair.

So, when she entered Runhilde's room, she reeled with relief to find the aging woman seated beside the window, straight-backed and apparently strong. Her gaze was locked upon some point far in the distance, out over the rooftops of Swallow's Rest towards the north.

But quick after the relief came a second wave of concern, for there was something stiff, unnatural in her posture.

"Mistress Silversmith?" she called out in a voice as soft as she could make it. Though she had been treating Runhilde for many months, the silversmith refused to suffer her given name to pass Aearis's lips.

"Who knows what she would do with it?" she had once muttered, very audibly, to Bereneth. "Bind me with that serpent's tongue of hers? Unmake my will with her sweet whispers?"Aearis had pretended not to hear. In truth, she could not be sure whether to be offended by the hostility or flattered by the overestimation of her powers.

But now Bereneth was not there, and the two women were alone together with their mutual suspicion and dread. Aearis approached, though her feet found themselves rooted, reluctant to carry her any closer to her stock-still patient. Even when she stood directly beside her, the dying woman did not move, but stayed with gaze fixed outward.

"How are you feeling today?" Aearis winced at the tentative, feeble hesitation in her own voice. But still, there was no answer. Truly alarmed now, Aearis bent to examine Runhilde's fair face, half-lit by the sunlight filtering in through the wooden shutters.

The eyes were still lit with life, and they focused on her face slowly-the right seemed to move only with difficulty and the eyelid drooped to show only a sliver of warm, chocolate brown beneath. Her face was strangely twisted, with the right side of her mouth hanging ajar while the left was contorted in pain.

A deep shudder ran through Aearis's body. Many years had it been since she had seen any such ailment, and even then, it had been uncommon for the bodies of Numenoreans to fail so. Once again, Runhilde's blood had betrayed her, starving her brain of fuel until it began to wither.

Using all the strength she could find in her arms, Aearis positioned herself to support Runhilde's weak side and half-guided, half-dragged the woman to her bed. Runhilde lay, horribly docile, as Aearis spread salves and tinctures over the dying muscles. When Aearis attempted to test her powers of speech, the woman stared at her with dead, uneven eyes, seemingly uncomprehending. Even the songs that sometimes revived the flagging fea of fading elves had no visible effect.

Finally, in desperation, Aearis called Runhilde's Name. She sang out a command to the woman's blood, pouring out all her will to power of the incantation, and pulled as hard as the could on the woman's waning spirit.

A hideous howl tore forth from the dying woman's lips and she writhed in the sheets, tangling them about her like a spider's web. She shrieked unintelligibly, no words and all meaning. Runhilde made to scratch at her own face, so Aearis seized her wrists and pinned them to the bed. For a moment she was again a mariner upon the western sea, tossed and buffeted by a force far greater than she. She sang on.

Then Runhilde wept, whimpering and pleading, though still she spoke in words without sense. So utterly devastating was the force of those feeble cries that Aearis nearly succumbed to pity then. But she thought of Bereneth, and sang on.

Runhilde raged and pleaded by turns, her tortured fea flailing out to slash at her healer's, but still, as her throat grew sore and her head began to ache, Aearis sang.

Then, finally, when the sun had set and risen again, the tempest passed. Runhilde's eyes fluttered shut and she slept, leaving Aearis to pace restlessly by her bedside, shaking from head to toe. In sleep, Runhilde's face was quite as lovely as it had always been, but it was now cracked with a web of fine, interweaving lines. Her hair had turned gray quite suddenly over the last year, and Aearis occupied herself for a while with brushing it back and gently relieving the tangles that their struggle had left. In the pale morning light, Runhilde looked terribly mesmeric.

Despite all her agonizing over the question of her Choice, Aearis had never thought much of her own death. It had seemed a distant, irrelevant matter-something to be done at a suitably dramatic moment in some daring act of self-sacrifice or other. But if that moment never came… was this how she was to end? Piteous and broken, devoid of color and fire? Idly, she examined a tendril of her own hair, dark and luminous, breaking the light into browns and reds and blues along its fibers. Rising from her seat at the bedside, she moved to regard her face in the bright silver mirror that hung above the nightstand, running a curious finger over her nose, her throat, her mouth. When she tried to picture the ravages of age as they would sit upon her, dulling her gaze and withering her lips, her imagination failed her.

To be otherwise than beautiful… the idea felt absurd, unthinkable. Aging must simply be a weakness of the blood of lesser Men. It was an ugly thought, but she could not help regard Runhilde with a note of newfound contempt. How could anything truly good be subject to such hideous decay?

The woman was stirring now, and Aearis pulled herself back to the present. She bent close as Runhilde tried to croak out unintelligible words. Her voice was nothing more than the creaking of willows in the wind.

When she finally understood the meaning, she recoiled.

"I will do nothing of the kind," she snarled, affronted. "I am a healer, madame."

With extraordinary quickness and strength, the mortal woman reached out her left hand and caught Aearis's chin in an iron grip, pulling her forward until their eyes met squarely. When she next heard Runhilde's voice, Aearis could not be certain if the words were spoken or if they sprang into her mind.

"_ You summoned me back with your trickery and your honeyed words. You promised me succor and mercy, but all I find is agony. _"

Aearis shuddered and struggled in Runhilde's grasp, but she found herself weak and shaking.

"I promised to heal you, and I will. If you just give me time-"

"**_Time._**" The word rang out, simultaneously a curse and a sigh. " _Elven hubris. There is no more time. Every moment more I spend here is a torture, and you would hold me here enslaved to your whim to satisfy your professional vanity." _

"I cannot kill you," Aearis choked out. "I am a healer."

"_ More lies. More vanity, _" the words hissed through her body, cutting with sharp edges. " _You who have slaughtered your enemies with steel and fire and madness. You who long to ride out and conquer all before you in the name of reason and mercy. _" Suddenly, the hand that held Aearis in place slackened, sending her sprawling to the floor. She felt the demands of the dying woman coursing through her bones. The pain and hatred coursing in Runhilde's blood had defeated her. Wordlessly, she fetched a quill, a tablet, and several sheets of paper, and she set them before Runhilde.

Though she had always been right-handed, now the silversmith wrote with her left, and her penmanship was shaky and hesitant. Often, she would stop and snarl, unable to access the words that had once come as easily as breathing. Aearis allowed the horrible connection between them to remain open, so that she could supply the lacking language where need arose.

Spirit healing was a terrible art, though none outside the few remaining centers of elven medical wisdom knew the full extent of it. To truly repair a thing, the healer had to lay herself open to it, to bind her will to it and set to reshaping what was distorted. Where there was loss, the healer smoothed the holes with her own fiber, leaving a part of herself forever in another. Usually the tears were small enough that the healer's patches were almost undetectable, and the parting of ways ended her connection to the patient. But where the damage ran deep and strong emotions clouded the healer's control, the division became ever more clouded. Here, the tapestry had been torn asunder completely, and Aearis could feel Runhilde's essence spilling over the boundary and mingling with her own.

For the hours that Runhilde labored over that letter, Aearis sat in a half-trance, watching dispassionately as her fea was slowly shredded, piece by piece. The scratch of the quill reverberated in her ears as though it were an executioner's drum. Runhilde never looked at her, but Aearis could not look anywhere other than at her patient, whose face seemed to be aging as quickly as the day was ending.

The air was warm, but her fingers were frozen. The wind sang, but her voice was silenced. Finally, when she thought she could bear no more, her silent vigil ended.

"Wax," croaked Runhilde in an empty voice. Aearis rummaged in the desk drawers until she found a red candle and a silver seal, inset with the image of a set of scales with swallows perched upon the beams. It was exquisitely wrought, and as it sank into the glistening red puddle Aearis wondered if there would ever again exist an artisan like Runhilde in all the lives of Men.

She accepted the letter from Runhilde with trembling hands. It felt extraordinarily heavy. In exchange, she pressed a tiny vial into the woman's palm.

"I will deliver it to her," she said, though her own voice felt so hollow that she could scarcely bear the sound of it, "with all your love."

Runhilde stared at the little bottle, seemingly fascinated by the swirling mist of iridescent white within.

"Is this all?" she asked haltingly.

"Olsith," Aearis replied. "Breathe it in, and nothing shall trouble you again. Do not take it until you are truly ready, for it acts fast, and-" She cut herself off, acutely aware of the absurdity of playing the healer at a time like this. "I will deliver the letter."

The mortal woman said nothing, and Aearis left without another word. She rode with the sinking sun at her left and the moon at her right, and the envelope heavy in her pocket. And when the sun had slipped finally under the horizon, she knew from the chill that sank into her marrow that Runhilde the Silversmith had died.

Aearis never knew the entirety of Runhilde's last letter to Bereneth. But from that day, there began the slightest of cracks in their most solid of bonds.

The summer stretched on, gorgeous and interminable, and each of them strove in their own ways to forget. Neither ever did.

* * *

**Author's notes:**

Sorry for the emotional whiplash between the last chapter of pure fluff and this one, which is... not that.

Still, fun fact: I just learned about a subfamily of extinct canids, Borophaginae, that are called the "bone-crushing dogs." Some of them were around the height of an adult human male. Since Tolkien has described the hounds in the Silmarillion to be large enough to ride, I've decided that I get to include dogs that match the description of the largest of these, Epicyon, in this universe.

Hence, Dinalagos, my big, fuzzy, hideous bone-crushing darling. If anyone was wondering if this story is a self-insert, it absolutely is now. I am Dinalagos. Minus any acts of athletic skill or bravery, obviously.


	13. The Gates of Summer

**Author's notes:**

I am now officially synchronized between AO3 and . For some reason I was much lazier about uploading to , but this chapter is going up at the same time on both sites! What that means for readers is that my update time will now be just as bad as it has always been on AO3, so... you're welcome?

* * *

"somewhere I have never travelled,gladly beyond

any experience,your eyes have their silence:

in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me

or which I cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me

though I have closed myself as fingers

you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens

(touching skilfully,mysteriously)her first rose"

\- e. e. cummings

_Summer, 2880 SA, Imladris_

The valley was aflutter with preparations for the week of midsummer festivities. Normally Aearis would have relished the whirring activity, but Elrond had been reluctant even to commission a song from her, concerned that Runhilde's death might paralyze his favored apprentice with grief. But, by a concerted regimen of unfailingly enforced good humor, she finally succeeded allaying his worries.

"You are a marvel, my dearest cousin," he remarked to her one night in the Hall of Fire. "Such forbearance in one so young… would that I had been so wise at your age. You bear your grief with such dignity, such composure."

Guilt nearly strangled Aearis as she restrained herself from casting a glance at Bereneth, who sat beside her, face still and blank, gaze fixed unseeing on the performing minstrels. The lie that Aearis had begun to cover her friend's secret now burned them both like a brand on their chests-Bereneth was forced to bear her heartbreak in silence while Aearis found herself called upon to perform it.

The girls spent many hours together that summer, but they spoke little. The question of the heavy letter hung between them, razor-sharp and divisive. Aearis had never asked Bereneth what the letter contained, but she imagined it to lay out in vicious clarity all her wrongs and missteps, all Runhilde's resentment and hatred of her. If she had been as wise and clear-sighted as Elrond supposed her to be, it might have occurred to her that the last letter Runhilde ever wrote to her beloved had more important feelings to express. But Aearis was young then, and perhaps her self-involvement might be forgiven on that count.

In the midst of that sweet, hot summer of celebration and camaraderie, Aearis's world felt bitter and cold, and terribly lonely. Her mother was often away-presumably conducting some manner of military business for Elrond, though as usual Gimlith said little and revealed even less. Kind Cestedir's mind was fully occupied with counseling Bereneth through her loss, for him alone she trusted with the full force of her sadness. Though Aearis could not begrudge them their private world, she could hardly help but resent the exclusion.

She might have minded less if Glorfindel were more readily available, but for several weeks her golden champion had been troublingly elusive and often preoccupied even when he was present. Privately she wondered if she had flirted with him just a little too much, forced him to put barriers where previously there were none. But surely he knew that she would never presume to form any serious designs on him? The thought was absurd to her-a half-elven half-bastard setting her sights on the herald of Manwe. The idea was laughable, even if the mirth was slightly tinged with sourness.

One day in the laboratory, she mustered the nerve to inquire after Glorfindel's wellbeing to Elrond, who smiled his sad, lovely smile and smoothed her hair affectionately. Valier, how she _hated _when he did that.

"I suspect that it is nothing that any of us can soothe for him, sweet child." _Child? Really? Did she _**_look _**_like a child?_ _Much less a sweet one. _She swallowed her irritation and prompted him to explain further. "You know, I suppose, of Lord Glorfindel's history. Of the city of Gondolin and…"

Aearis listened with half an ear as Elrond reviewed, in far too much detail, the history of Gondolin and its houses. _Was he always this bloody didactic? _She focused instead on the beauty of his silver eyes, the delicate strength of his jaw, the slight pout of his lower lip… She perked up only when he came to the matter of the fall of the hidden city. "It was the first night of summer you see, when all of Gondolin united for the festival of the Gates of Summer, the most beloved of their ceremonies. And on that most sacred of nights, Morgoth moved against the Hidden City and tore it asunder. I suspect that Glorfindel's sleep has been troubled of late, haunted by the dawn that never came."

Aearis lapsed into thought for a while, returning to the highly reactive concoction that she had created in a glass bottle. So preoccupied was she that Elrond was forced to catch her hand before she absently added fire root. A foolish way to die that would have been. The contact of his elegant hand wrapped around her wrist sent the customary shiver through her body, but, perhaps due to her present distraction, the effect was rather less than usual.

"The Gates of Summer…" she mused aloud. Glorfindel's final sunrise. "Perhaps we ought to mark it somehow. To restore joy to the memory of what was lost."

Elrond smiled again, but he shook his head even as he gently wrested the potion from her fingers.

"A pretty idea, Aearis. But remember, Tarnin Austa was held on the first day of summer, which passed weeks ago now. And indeed, I cannot see how celebrating the day of Gondolin's fall would do anything but agitate his grief."

Aearis ceded the point demurely and dropped the subject, but at the back of her mind, the seed of the idea remained, forming quietly.

As if to further exasperate Aearis's discomfort, a week before the start of the Midsummer Festival, a delegation of extraordinary beauty and distinction rode into the Vale of Bruinen. At the head rode a lady, black-haired and pale as clouds, clad in elaborately beaded silver silk. On her brow blazed a sapphire circlet, and in her eyes shone the night sky. She was Lady Rhossorieth Ingloriel, right hand of King Gil-Galad himself, and rumor of her arrival spread through the valley like wildfire.

Rhossorieth's arrival marked a sudden shift in the Imladris air. From the moment she set foot in the valley, she was rarely parted from Lord Elrond, who welcomed her with joy that Aearis found rather excessive. Glorfindel greeted her as an old friend, and even Aearis's grumpy mother seemed taken with her. Bereneth was quickly enlisted to act as her personal guard, escorting Lady Rhossorieth from engagement to engagement, and was thus entirely inaccessible.

Aearis, despite her frequent reminders to herself that she was, in fact, a fully-grown and self-sufficient adult, was vexed. She could not even secure Lindir to practice and critique the songs that she composed for the festivities-for he was frantically occupied with preparations for Midsummer, rushing too and fro with all the composure of a mad squirrel, hanging floral wreaths on posts, arches, trees, and, occasionally, people. Though she aided him as much as she could, Aearis had little skill or patience for ceremony or decoration, and she found that any action she took was quickly reversed by more able hands.

So, left to her own devices, she took to the library. At first her searches were rather fruitless, for Elrond's principles of organization were… abstract, to say the least. But she was saved by sharp-nosed Noenor, still caught in a haggard, deliriously happy daze of new fatherhood. In between rapturous accounts of his newborn son's every sneeze, he put himself entirely at her disposal. If her need had been less, she might have found his hysterical gratitude off-putting. But his assistance was invaluable, and between the two of them, Aearis was soon satisfied that she had amassed every available volume containing even a passing mention of Gondolin. Then, with the vigor of a woman with absolutely nothing else to do, she set to work.

* * *

The arrival of the party from Lindon set Glorfindel's already-beleaguered mind spinning at a nearly fatal velocity. The sudden appearance of Gil-Galad's most valued advisor must indicate something major, some looming catastrophe, and Glorfindel braced for it even as he greeted his old friend with warm smiles and words of welcome. Rhossorieth, utterly inscrutable as ever, toured the perimeter defenses with her usual impassive smile. Only after two days of silent appraisal of everything from the armory to the bath house did she offer an opinion.

"Your realm has grown greatly," she remarked to Elrond. "I congratulate you. 'Tis a joy to hear the voices of children again. Evidently your people feel secure and protected, to bring you such a blessing."

Elrond blushed deeply at the compliment. Though Celebrian had long ago captured his heart, he was not blind to Rhossorieth's magisterial beauty. Few were.

But Glorfindel was less moved by her words, for he sought the meaning behind her praise. It was said that when Rhossorieth and Galadriel took counsel together, more was said in two words exchanged between the women than the greatest library could contain.

"Glorfindel merits most of the credit for that, my lady," he replied, casting his eyes downward like a shy elfling. "The walls he has built and the defenses he has designed are as strong as they are subtle." Rhossorieth's smile was eloquent.

"Lord Glorfindel's work is, as ever, flawless. How fortunate that he has been allowed to remain here for so long an interlude to assist you in fortifying your beautiful village."

Elrond was too perceptive to miss the implication of her words, and Glorfindel's heart broke at the crestfallen look in those wide gray eyes.

"Yes," he replied, the sadness in his voice only thinly veiled with courtesy and gratitude, "His Majesty King Gil-Galad has been generous indeed to grant us the privilege of Glorfindel's presence."

Rhossorieth gave him a sharp smile and returned to her examination of the irrigation system in the crop fields.

"You shall soon need to grow more food if your population continues to swell, for trade is much reduced in these evil times. The mountain streams could be better harnessed if you build underground canals. Erestor can furnish you with schematics to assist you in the design and construction."

Elrond nodded and gestured to Noenor, who scurried off to find Rhossorieth's chief counsellor. The conversation moved on from there, and Glorfindel struggled to attend as he pondered her meaning. Finally, the party disbanded for the evening, and Glorfindel took Rhossorieth aside. Or did she take him aside? It was impossible to tell.

"Rhossorieth," he started.

"Glorfindel," she replied, raising a quizzical brow. She was the picture of puzzled attentiveness.

"Why have you come?" he asked, though he knew from experience that a direct question was as likely to trap her as a fishing net to trap a gust of wind. To his absolute shock, her answer was perfectly blunt.

"To bring you back to Lindon, obviously." She noted his surprise at the direct answer with dry amusement and waited patiently for his response. When none came, she supplied it for him. "Perhaps I have grown tactless in my venerable old age. But we are such friends, Glorfindel-surely the need for delicacy is long past for us."

Glorfindel nodded slowly, weighing her words carefully before responding.

"Indeed, there can be no call for dissimulation between old friends," he said. Rhossorieth's expression did not change, but he saw her deep blue eyes harden slightly. She knew very well that she would not like what he said next. "So I will return your candor in kind: I cannot leave Imladris."

She leaned forward with cold interest, searching him with her penetrating gaze.

"Oh?" Her voice was chillingly calm. "And why is that?"

"I have unfinished business here," he said, and was encouraged to hear that his voice was strong. "I am needed."

"You are not." Her gaze was growing harder by the second. He met it and remained silent, determined to give her nothing to argue against if he could help it. They stayed frozen for a moment, locked in a silent clash of wills. But her curiosity forced her to buckle first. "Why do you cling to this place? You came here for a wedding nearly twenty years ago. What did you find that captured you so?"

Just then, as Glorfindel was formulating a noncommittal reply, a figure approached them and shattered his calm like a flower pot sailing through a glass window. It was the kind of magnificently terrible timing that Aearis had honed to perfection. She appeared beside them as if summoned like some fell spirit.

In the light of the setting sun, she caught the light as vividly as a wildflower, dressed in poppy red with her hair escaping its loose ties to curl haphazardly about her face.

He had managed, by dint of his extraordinary soldier's instincts, to keep mostly clear of her for the last several weeks, and the separation had been simultaneously excruciating and soothing. In truth, he had not been hard pressed to avoid her, for Aearis had been curiously absent for several days out of each week, and no one seemed inclined to reveal the nature of her frequent disappearances. An unpleasant voice in his mind had taken to supposing that she must have taken up with one of her swains, who would sweep her away to some private corner of the forest. So it was with some perverse mingling of ecstasy and agony that he greeted her now, at this absolute worst of moments, as she knocked the breath from his lungs by her mere presence.

"Aearis," he breathed, once he could muster the mental faculties necessary for speech. "I… Hello."

"Hello," she replied, glancing between him and Rhossorieth with inquisitive eyes.

"Hello," said Rhossorieth, and Glorfindel saw to his horror that her eyes were fixed on Aearis, cataloguing every detail. He could only suppose that if Rhossorieth and Galadriel could fill a library with two words, Aearis and Rhossorieth might actually rip Arda apart at the seams with a single glance. He braced himself as the women appraised each other, feeling oddly irrelevant.

Aearis curtseyed deeply, but with deliberate clumsiness. She appeared to have deduced that in the presence of a lady like Rhossorieth, it was wise to seem as unthreatening as possible. Rhossorieth noted the curtsey, and the intentional lack of grace, with evident appreciation, and returned the gesture with a perfect, shallow dip of her own.

"You are the bard Aearis, are you not?" If the neglect of her title chafed at Aearis, she showed no sign of it. "What a privilege to meet you in person. I have so adored your lovely little mariner's lays in the Hall of Fire."

Aearis smiled in return, all starry-eyed delight.

"You do me too much honor, my lady," she murmured, her eyes still cast downwards. Glorfindel noted with a kind of hysterical amusement how she exaggerated her accent to lend a coarse edge to her modest words. "It is the highest distinction that I could imagine that my silly songs reach the ears of such a one as you."

Rhossorieth's smile grew, revealing a row of perfect, gleaming white teeth.

"The _highest _distinction?" said she in that voice of cool silk. "Surely not. The very highest distinction must be to perform to the King."

Glorfindel's heart plummeted. Well, that was one way to get him to return to Lindon. At the sight of his reaction to the girl's arrival, Rhossorieth had immediately and correctly deduced _exactly _what kept him in Imladris. He watched with a sense of dread as Aearis's eyes grew as wide as saucers.

"Play to His Majesty, my lady? I am sure I have never dreamed of so high an honor." The discomfort in her voice sounded like pleasing humility, but Glorfindel was certain that Aearis was remembering the court of Lothlorien and living under the yoke of a great elven ruler.

"You are too modest, my dear," purred Rhossorieth. "You would adorn the King's court with your talents, I am certain. And there are many resources at Mithlond that you might find much to your advantage. Why, the minstrels and healers could instruct your skills in ways that Imladris can never hope to match-meaning no disrespect to Lord Elrond, of course."

"I have no doubt that Mithlond is an exceptional center of wisdom, Lady Rhossorieth," replied Aearis. The conversation was clearly getting away from her, with no courteous way to end it.

"And, of course, I imagine that you would quite like to live near the sea again." More than anything else Rhossorieth had said, this last point had a clear effect on Aearis. At the mention of the sea, her expressive eyes misted over instantly, and she could do nothing to conceal her longing. Sensing her advantage, Rhossorieth pressed on. "Lord Glorfindel will soon be returning to Lindon. Would it not be pleasant to travel together?"

The impact of the last statement jerked Aearis's body visibly. She did not spare him a look, but instead held Rhossorieth's incisive stare with almost insubordinate steadiness.

"Certainly, Lord Glorfindel is a marvelous companion on the road. He knows so very many traveling songs." She paused for a moment, then curtseyed deeply once again, this time with perfect grace. "You do me great honor, Lady Rhossorieth, with your suggestions. I assure you that I shall give them all due consideration."

There was an element of finality in her voice, and Rhossorieth was shrewd enough not to push further at present. It would be sufficient to allow Aearis to reflect privately upon what was said, to allow the offer to work its magic upon her ambition and vanity. So she returned the curtsey, slightly lower than at first meeting, and swept away with the appropriate greeting, leaving Glorfindel and Aearis in loaded silence. He could not see her eyes, for she had cast them downwards,

"Aearis," he began at last, "I-"

"I miss you," she interrupted. Just as well, for he had little idea what he might have said.

"You… miss me?" He blinked at her, feeling very conscious of his own lack of eloquence.

She grinned and raised her hand to display a covered wicker basket. He shot it a suspicious look.

"Is that some manner of horrid beast that you have captured for medical purposes?" he asked, vividly recalling the Great Spider Incident of 2878. Her grin became wickeder.

"Oh, how I wish it were. Do you know that Elrond has explicitly banned venomous snakes from the healing halls now? _Such _a lack of imagination. No, not quite as exciting as that, but still not at all bad. With a flourish, she unveiled the basket to reveal an ambitious array of meats, cheeses, mushrooms, and desserts. "Dornor in the kitchens owed me a favor, so I thought we might have a bit of a picnic."

Glorfindel examined the content of the basket carefully, keeping a ready eye out for errant "medicinal scorpions." He was touched to note that not only were there no apparent dangerous insects concealed within, but Aearis had secured his favorite honeysuckle wine and strawberry pastries for the occasion.

When he had finished his inspection, he looked up to meet Aearis's eyes, utterly weakened in his resolve to keep his distance. But instead of dancing blues and greens, he found himself staring into a fierce, hungry yellow gaze. A guttural growl rumbled, seeming to spring from the core of the world itself, rising to shudder through his bones.

"Dinalagos," Aearis said in a sharp, commanding tone from somewhere behind the great, snarling maw, "get down! What have I said about threatening my prospects? Be nice to the handsome ones!"

The great brute whimpered in apology and sank down to lie at her feet. Glorfindel eyed the creature warily, and it returned his appraising look with no less skepticism.

"I see Gimlith got her… dog." He pronounced the last word with deliberate doubt. "How delightful."

"He is to be my chaperone today," she replied, ignoring the clear mistrust between her two companions. "In case I try to eat too many boiled sweets or something, I suppose. Conveniently, he also doubles as a serviceable mount. Climb on!"

The beast rose to its feet once more-its eyes were nearly level with Glorfindel's. Slowly, it bowed deeply to allow them to clamber onto its back, Aearis in front. Glorfindel followed her lead, too disoriented to resist. Beneath the shaggy coat, the creature's body rippled with muscle, though well-padded with a layer of fat for which Aearis, no doubt, could claim full credit. As soon as Glorfindel was well-situated on its back, his arms wrapped tightly around Aearis's slender waist, the hound began to run.

They tore through the forest like a silent hurricane, the beast carrying them between the trees unerringly and with terrifying speed. When they came to the foot of the mountains, Glorfindel allowed his muscles to relax, more than ready to dismount, though the feeling of Aearis's heartbeat against his ribs was a sweet, brutal torture. But far from stopping, the creature leapt forward and bounded up over the crags in the rock face, sure-footed as a leopard, carrying them up the sheer cliffs with seemingly limitless energy. For one distracted moment, Glorfindel thought of the sweet wine and delicate pastries, now surely dashed against the rocks beneath. But for the most part, his mind was occupied by the wind whipping his face and stinging his eyes, the tendrils of dark hair flying back to entwine him in a tangled embrace, and the warmth where his arms were clutching Aearis for dear life.

_What a way to die._

But, finally, they emerged from the steep climb and rested at last upon a gently sloping plateau, where a series of minor creeks carved the surface of the earth and cascaded off the edge to create a series of tiered waterfalls. The sun's last light was still insistently hot, but the air was wet with spray, and it caught the light in shifting rainbows. Stubborn trees and grasses had sunk their roots into cracks in the stone and painted the plateau a thousand shades of green. Aearis leaned back against Glorfindel's torso and sighed contentedly. An impish breeze picked up a curl of her hair and tickled his nose with it, but he would not have brushed it away for anything in the world.

"Perfect, no?" her voice was little more than a sigh. Then she winced, and Glorfindel realized that he had tightened his grip on her waist a little too much. He let her go instantly, and she leapt from the dog's back and produced the basket, still perfectly covered and contained, from beneath her cloak. From it, she pulled what appeared to be a whole chicken, which she tossed to her hound, and smiled fondly at the horrific spectacle as the beast crunched the meal, bones and all, in its massive maw.

Glorfindel dismounted gingerly, wary of disturbing the macabre feast. There were far too many questions to ask at present, so he settled for the most puzzling of them.

"How did you manage to keep hold of the food?" He could not keep the wonder out of his voice. She smiled proudly and tugged at the ropes that kept the cover in place over the basket. The elaborate knots unravelled instantly under her touch.

"No matter how many centuries I spend in the realms of elves, my friend, I will always be a Numenorean at heart. And when a Numenorean ties a knot, it damn well stays tied until otherwise instructed."

Glorfindel made certain to keep any hint of the effect of her words off his face.

_Always a Numenorean at heart. _

The chill that had set in weeks ago outside Gimlith's cabin, which had been temporarily blown away by the exhilaration, returned to gnaw at his bones once again.

But he smiled at her as they sat down to their meal, congratulating her heartily on her clever mariner's tricks. The cool, iridescent air and the song of the rushing water, coupled with the heady potency of the honeysuckle wine, quickly lulled them into a pleasant state of near-delirium. Aearis recounted several tales of the exploits of the Marine Guard at Andustar that had Glorfindel howling with laughter.

"Poor Aglaran," she said, shaking her head with a rueful smile. "He would not venture out onto the sea for months after that. In the end, mother had to force me to show him how I created the illusion of a sea serpent out of mirrors."

"I supposed I should count myself lucky that we do not live by the shore," Glorfindel mused. "It seems that the brine has a way of enhancing your already wicked ways."

Aearis smiled, a little sadly. Silence descended upon them as both their minds were pulled to Rhossorieth's proposals.

"Aearis-" he started. He wanted to tell her not to go to Lindon. That he would abandon his fealty to Gil-Galad in an instant if it meant that they could stay together in this wonderful valley forever. That he would gladly die with her name on his lips to keep her happy and free.

But she held up a hand, and he stopped speaking instantly.

"The sun is starting to set," she said. He raised a brow in mute question. "It was brought to my attention," she explained, "that Tarnin Austa passed unmarked this year." At the mention of the festival of Gondolin, his heart performed a painful series of maneuvers. He started to speak again, but she forestalled him. "I know that celebration brought great pain once, but perhaps we could make it a day of hope again." She looked so nervous and vulnerable, terrified that he would be offended or worse. He smiled at her with the full warmth and gratitude that he felt for her, and saw her relax visibly as she returned the smile and leapt to her feet. Gladly he took her proffered hand and rose to follow her. She led him away from the cliff, to a great, branching oak beside one of the stronger streams.

"I did a bit of research," she said, speaking quickly and nervously, "about the midnight ritual, and gathered as many of the materials as I could find, but you shall have to help me with the particulars." At the base of the oak was a large, bulging pack, and from it she quickly produced striking stones, tiny silver lanterns with windows of many-faceted crystal, and several hundred small candles. She looked up from her work to fix him with a serious look. "Do _not _tell Lindir that I borrowed his lanterns. He is already about one gentle breeze away from snapping."

The sky was bloody red now, the sun halfway gone. What to say, before he could speak no more?* Aearis was sucking on a quill while squinting over a scroll in the dying light, unheeding of the black ink that now coated her lips.

"You have made me happier than I ever thought I could be." The words left his mouth before he had thought to form them. She glanced up at him absently and smiled with black teeth.

"Do please wait to make such a statement. I may very well butcher the whole ritual."

He wanted to correct her, tell her that his statement would be true even if she proceeded to slaughter a cow and bathe in its blood, but just then the sun vanished from view and Aearis pressed a finger to her inky lips. In silence, they set to stringing the lamps onto the boughs of the great oak and lighting them, until they were veiled in the glimmer of the silver and the dancing prismatic light from the carefully-crafted crystal. Then Aearis set to arranging the candles on the ground in an elaborate maze with the tree at the center.

Night fell in earnest, moonless and starry, and a warm wind stirred the chimes that hung from the lanterns until the air sang. They began each at opposite sides of the outer perimeter of the maze. Proceeding slowly, lighting each candle as they went, they walked the winding paths towards each other.

Glorfindel did not dare look at her as he moved, but he was sharply, urgently aware of her at every moment, and he could have sworn that the wind chimes were singing her name, over and over, like a command. The fragrant wind tormented his sensitive skin with its small hands. He was entirely unfurled, laid perfectly, terrifyingly open.

Then they met in the middle, where only the last candle remained dark. They knelt and struck their stones together to ignite the final spark.

As they rose together, his heart was thundering fast and painful in his chest, and it took him a moment to realize that it was not only Aearis's proximity that was causing the panic. Not for centuries had he revisited the excruciating details of the last night of Gondolin. He was not one for dwelling, and he found that a hefty dose of oltinen, a draught of dreamless sleep, did wonders to silence nightmares. But now, as he looked out over the sea of candles, he remembered.

_510 FA_

The central courtyard of Gondolin, where the flowering fountain sang its perpetual song of peace and protection, was entirely given over to the candle maze. Laurefindil stood at the perimeter of the maze, feeling itchily impatient and devoting most of his effort to avoiding the hopeful gazes of the unattached ladies on either side of him. He flinched involuntarily as he felt a small, sharp impact at his temple, and turned to scowl half-heartedly at the source of the projectile: a grinning Ecthelion, who sat smugly among the spectators with lovely Alarce. Clever bastard, to get betrothed right before he could be compelled to walk the candle maze once again.

Ecthelion waggled his eyebrows at him and jerked his head indiscreetly towards Ambalie, who stood not far away, fiddling absently with her striking stones. Alarce dug an elbow into her beloved's ribs and cast Laurefindil an apologetic look, but she could not quite suppress her laughter.

The candle maze was, without doubt, the most irritating mass-matchmaking endeavor ever conceived, and he placed the blame squarely on Salgant's shoulders. Oh, the ceremony itself was beautiful, of course. But the cost of frantically fending off whichever lady the maze led him to for the remainder of the summer was troublesome, to say the least.

Across the fountain, Laurefindil could just make out Maeglin, standing straight-backed and glowingly pale in the candle light, rubbing his hands together in his usual nervous way. The candle maze always set him sweating, but he looked particularly perturbed this year. Laurefindil could only imagine that the pressure to marry that King Turgon always put on his adored nephew had grown rather stronger of late. Laurefindil could not bring himself to like the twitchy, irascible Maeglin, even despite the strong resemblance he bore to his wonderful mother. Still, tonight he found himself pitying the young man, who stole frequent, furtive glances at Idril where she sat whispering to her handsome husband Tuor. Little Earendil, all golden hair and freckled insolence, slumped beside his mother, idly tying elaborate knots in a piece of twine looped around his hands. Idril fell silent with an unrepentant shrug when Turgon sent her a look of kingly disapprobation, but resumed her whispered conversation as soon as he turned away.

And then there was Ambalie. Oh, Ambalie. How lovely she was, with her round, kind face, her twinkling birdsong voice, her bright golden hair. Ecthelion had long ago selected her as a proper and fitting wife for Laurefindil, citing as his principal reasons her gentleness and her unfailing patience.

"You know you need that, my lovely," he would chide. And, as usual, he was perfectly correct. Ambalie would make him happy and peaceful. Soothe his brow and tend his wounds with never a harsh word for his recklessness, his carelessness, his restless spirit. But the only woman he had ever imagined himself able to love had slipped away from him long ago, and he had never again met her equal.

So, when darkness descended, Laurefindil began his slow advance through the field of candles, kneeling dutifully to light each one. Thousands of pinpricks of jewel-colored light danced over the courtyard, and above them the stars and the silver lanterns glimmered together as a single, radiant firmament. No minstrels played, but the night was bright with the music of the wind, the crickets, and the fountain. Laurefindil spared a look around, and appreciated despite himself the flickering sea of golden fire that stretched out around him. As he knelt at the next candle, another pair of hands, delicate and trembling slightly, entered his view.

He looked up to see Ambalie smiling bashfully at him. Her eyes were questioning, asking permission to share the lighting of the last candle with him. He was touched by her diffident affection. It was well known how dearly she loved him, for she wore her tender heart always on her sleeve. But even now, when, by the traditions of the festival, he was hers to monopolize for the remainder of the night, she proceeded tentatively, with concern only for his happiness. He resolved that, if he could not love her as he ought, he would at least give her this silent night of total devotion. Until dawn, he would be hers.

He returned her smile, and moved his hands to clasp hers. Together, they struck the final spark. The brilliance of her smile could know no equal-not the sea of candles, not the glittering fountain, not even the starry sky, and he reveled in it. Who was to say? Perhaps he would surprise himself with her. Love could come with time, and time they had.

Something soft as a feather, fine as dust, landed on his nose, tickling him abominably. He frowned and raised his hand to wipe it away, not removing his eyes from Ambalie's face. It smudged strangely under his fingers. When he glanced down, he saw a smear of black on his hand. He looked back at Ambalie, and saw that her bright hair was crowned with ash. It was falling fast, catching in their eyelashes and drying their lips. A shadow fell over his heart, and he rose slowly, knowing that when he looked up, all peace would be lost to him.

He took a deep, calming breath, interlaced his fingers with Ambalie's-her trembling hand steadied when he wrapped it in his own-and turned his eyes to the sky. The glare of the silver lamps obscured much of what lay beyond, and he blinked furiously as the falling ash clouded his eyes. Then a fell, frigid wind swept through the courtyard from above, extinguishing the maze of candles in a wave of darkness, and Laurefindil finally realized what he saw. Or, rather, what he did not see. There was a hole in the night sky, a patch of absolute, starless blackness, growing in size every second. He reached for his sword, but remembered, cursing Salgant bitterly, that he had not been allowed to bring it to the ritual. The crowd remained perfectly silent, every eye transfixed on the expanding shadow. Then horrible realization struck, and a single voice rang out, shattering that pristine, echoing silence.

_"Dragon!"_

The city erupted.

_2880 SA_

It was not a voice that returned him to the present, but a hand, small and cool, laid against his cheek so softly that it might have been a dream. It spoke to him as clearly as if she had called his name, and he snapped back instantly. Aearis regarded him intently, her thumb tracing absently over his cheek. He raised his own hand to capture hers, bring it to his lips and kiss it reverently, and found that it tasted of salt. With no little consternation, he discovered that he was crying. Thick, hot tears that drenched his face and ran down Aearis's arm. He made to pull away, but she shook her head and pulled his face down to rest his brow against hers. They stood there for he knew not how long as he soaked both their faces in brine and shook them with silent, racking sobs.

Finally, his tears were exhausted, and he fell against her with all his weight. She bore it, pulling him in until their hearts were pressed together, and their chaotic rhythms aligned. Then, the song of the night reached him again, and he found that they were dancing, their feet weaving between the little flickering flames. They carried each other through the maze of flame, their movements sending ripples out over the candles so that the golden expanse danced with them.

Slowly, the sea of fire fell away as each candle burned to extinction and sputtered out, and they stood among the silver stars. He straightened himself out gradually, remaining as close to her as he could. She led him to the oak, and they climbed into the crook in the branching trunk, which cradled them tenderly as they curled up together.

Time passed deliciously slowly and excruciatingly fast. For a time she tried to play on a small silver flute, but every time she tried, tears choked her. Eventually he wrested it gently from her limp fingers, and he slowly sounded out an old lullaby half-remembered from another life as she nestled against him and tickled his chin with her dark hair.

Now, in the enveloping protection of the silent night, with her at his side, it was safe to cast his mind back to what was. He walked the streets of Gondolin with her at his side, showed her the flowering fountain, the three spires of Turgon's palace. He took her to hide with him in the secret gardens of his manor, where thousands of songbirds wove their voices together in elaborate harmonies. She mocked him gently with Idril and Ecthelion, danced through the cobbled streets with bare feet, climbed the walls of his house and rapped at his window while he tried to work. He wove together a wreath of golden flowers to set in her dark curls, and their children complained loudly when he swept her up and kissed her.

Her hand roused him again when she raised it lazily to tug on a strand of his hair, and his arm tightened around her waist. She gestured towards the east, where the first rosy glow was creeping over the horizon. Slowly, unwillingly, he lowered the flute from his lips and focused all his effort to fix the sensation of holding her forever in his mind. A new sort of panic set in as the first ray of gold fell over their plateau, but she met his eyes with her stormy gaze and pressed her hand to the hollow between his ribs, and he was calmed. So they watched the sun emerge, and the warmth spread through him until he felt almost drunk on tranquility. Beside him, she began to sing softly. The words were for the sun, in a language she did not fully understand. But the song was for him, and he loved her for it. Tentatively, he joined his voice with hers, remembering the words slowly, like the faces of old friends.

"The sun is risen," she whispered when the song drew to a close. "And all is well." He held her close, closer than his own skin, and breathed her like air.

* * *

Midsummer Week passed in a whirl of color and merriment, and furnished more than enough gossip to keep all the denizens of Imladris quite sated through the winter. Each night of festivities was lovelier and more extravagant than the last, and Lady Rhossorieth declared the whole affair a marvel worthy of King Gil-Galad himself. At this most generous of praise, Lindir fainted dead away with pleasure and long-suspended exhaustion, but Aearis determined that he would, most likely, revive with nothing worse than bruises.

Between Glorfindel and Aearis, few words were exchanged during the festival. They danced together several times, but no more than what was proper. But through the seven lively nights, each remained constantly aware of the position of the other without ever glancing around to find them. She knew, though she could not describe, that the feelings that they had shared freely in the perfect silence beneath the great oak ran deeper than blood and longer than time. There was no word that she knew, in any language, that could adequately capture what he was to her. All she knew was that there were now only two states that seemed to matter: being with him, and being away from him.

The former was too much sensation to endure for long, for it was as if all her skin and flesh and muscle and bone had been peeled away layer by layer to expose whatever it was that was left of her to the blazing, blinding light of him. She could scarcely glance into his endless eyes without drowning. If she had been better-_if she had been Bereneth, _said one of the unkinder voices in her mind-she might have borne it with more courage. But as it was, the burning, suffocating brightness of him scalded and frightened her.

If his presence was too wonderful to bear, his absence was a sort of empty misery. How had she never noticed how dark the world was when he was away? On the brightest of days, when he was gone the world was lit only by guttering candles. But the shadows were, after all, where she had always felt safest. And in comparison to total naked vulnerability in broad daylight, she welcomed the chilly abyss.

But she could not avoid him entirely, and indeed she could not quite bring herself to want to. And in general when they did meet, they spoke of minor matters in light, casual voices. Yet still that distracting intimacy persisted in every minor gesture, every glance, every expression. But eventually, as summer drew to a close, the silence between them was broken.

"Lady Rhossorieth is quite keen that you should go to Lindon," he began one day, when they found themselves walking together to supper. His sidelong look was keen, and she shifted uncomfortably beside him.

"She is kindness itself," she hedged cautiously, unwilling to answer his unspoken question. "I am certainly undeserving of such attention."

"That could not be further from the truth," said he, and she flinched at the sudden heat in his voice. "You… you would be a rare and extraordinary gift if she were to deliver you into Gil-Galad's hands." The dark resonance of his pronouncement stopped her short, and she turned towards him despite herself.

"You speak as though she were a huntress and I her prey," she observed, hoping to pass it for a jest. "Is it common to view matters of court through such a… scintillating lens?"

He regarded her somberly for a moment, and before she could react he had whisked her away from the garden path, into a secluded alcove draped with clinging rose vines. When she made to speak in protest-or whatever she had been about to say-he held up a finger to hover a hair's breadth from her lips.

"You are less prey than bait, Aearis." He spoke quickly, in a low, fervent voice. "For while she would indeed be pleased to find another subject to swell Gil-Galad's power, it is for my sake that she courts you with such determination. For she knows that only your presence could ensure my return to Mithlond." If he noticed how Aearis started at this last admission, spoken so calmly and plainly, he made no indication of it and pressed on. "As such she will employ every tool in her considerable arsenal to secure you, and I beg you to keep your wits about you. Rhossorieth is an excellent woman, and honorable in her own way, but her fealty lies only with Gil-Galad. Your interests are not hers."

The plain, unconcealed statement of so long-unspoken a fact shocked Aearis to her core, and the weight of it felt like a shackle.

"My presence," she repeated in a murmur, wishing him to retract his careless confession with all her heart. "My lord-"

"Please, Azruari," he cried in despair, and the sound of her true name said in such anguish pierced her to her core, "do not shy from what you know to be true. Not when it would be so willfully stupid to deny it. You know beyond a shadow of a doubt how I feel, what I want, and that I feel and want with no hope of reciprocation. Do not torment me by forcing me to leave unspoken what can be plainly seen."

She fixed her eyes on one of the blooms upon the climbing vine and said nothing, for the weight of his beautiful heart constricted her breath and left her mute.

"I ask nothing," he continued in an even voice. "Nothing, save that you make this decision _only _for you, and with your eyes wide open. Your life will change if you go to Lindon, and it will never return to what it was. Promise me that you will protect yourself, and I will rest easy."

"I cannot make any such promise," she replied, "while your life and honor hangs in the balance. Selfish I may be, but I cannot be the means of your destruction." He opened his mouth to argue, but she raised a hand and he was struck dumb instantly. "I see that I have long allowed my childhood whim to torment us both. Too long. I named you my champion once, and gave you a token to seal it. Do you have that token?"

Wordlessly, but with eloquently pleading eyes, he untied the first three fastenings of his doublet and drew from beneath his shirt a silk bandanna of brilliant scarlet. For a moment it looked as though he were bleeding from the heart, and the expression of hopeless agony that twisted his wonderful face seemed to confirm it. He held it out to her, and slowly she closed her fingers around it. They stood there, haloed by thorns and joined only by the tangled red fabric. She met his eyes squarely, and summoned every cold night, every bitter dream, every disappointed hope, to steel her heart against him.

"Laurefindil, my champion," she felt the vice of her command settle over him with the invocation of his name, "I have only one more request to make of you. That you shall go to Lindon and fulfill your duty to King Gil-Galad no matter where my fate may take me. Will you promise me this?"

One might have thought that she had driven Echiar between his ribs at the tremor that shocked his body. She watched as impassively as her screaming heart allowed her, but he soon regained his composure enough to answer.

"I do," said he, in a clear and ringing voice. She felt the truth of it in her bones.

"Then, with the exception of this last duty, I release you from my service," she said. His hand slackened and dropped, leaving the red bandanna dripping from her hands.

Then he bowed deeply to her, a cold and courtly bow that placed them immediately at great distance, and he was gone.

"or if your wish be to close me, I and

my life will shut very beautifully,suddenly,

as when the heart of this flower imagines

the snow carefully everywhere descending;"

-e. e. cummings

* * *

**More author's notes:**

A little bit of background of Tarnin Austa, the start-of-summer festival of Gondolin: Most of the detail about the festival was removed in later versions of the canon, but from what I can piece together, all the citizens of Gondolin assembled on the night before summer started. The rituals completed are not specified, but Tolkien did write that no one was permitted to speak all of that night, and when the dawn came they broke their silence to great the daybreak with ancient song. I've clearly taken a lot of liberties, but I hope that this depiction of the festival feels... elvish enough.

On another note, with the introduction of Rhossorieth I feel that I've officially tipped into "way too many damn OCs to expect anyone to keep them straight" territory, so I'm working on putting together some sort of guide, hopefully with modest visual aids. My only excuse for the army of original characters is that I really can't find enough mentions of powerful female characters in the second age, so I didn't really see much that I could do short of inventing some or letting history be entirely run by male characters. Rhossorieth's name means (roughly) "Lady crowned in whispers," but don't expect too much from my bastardized Sindarin naming.


	14. Fading

**Author's note:** So sorry this took so long! I've gotten quite busy, but also these next two chapters were extraordinarily difficult to write. Hopefully I can pick up my pace again soon.

* * *

'And what shall I remember?' said she. 'And when I go, to what halls shall I come? To a darkness in which even the memory of the sharp flame shall be quenched?'"

-J.R.R. & Christopher Tolkien, "Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth"

_2880 SA, Imladris_

The magic of that summer extended long into autumn, sheltering the valley in warmth and comfort. But slowly, inexorably, the nights grew longer and colder, and a wind blew in from the north, fragrant with snow. Aearis slept less and less, for the lengthening shadows danced around her ankles and nipped at the corners of her mind, reminding her none too kindly of the questions that clouded her vision.

Rhossorieth's proposal had taken root in her heart and driven old, untended longings to the forefront of her mind. So many years had she passed in the mist of the Vale of Bruinen, kept complacent and mostly happy by the comfort of modest everyday usefulness. She had revelled in the peace she found in Elrond's gaze, in the friendly heat of the Hall of Fire, the cozy herbal haze of the Healing Halls. Her grasp of medicinal lore had expanded rapidly, recklessly, and now Elrond's patient guidance, his steady oversight, felt more confining than reassuring. Her notebooks swelled with plans for techniques that he would never sanction, and every time a patrol rode out without her, she itched with angry impatience. Every day, her leaping spirit chafed more cruelly under his gentle hand.

When she had been young, small, and frightened, Elrond's kindness and acceptance had inspired such love in her that it had seemed bearable to surrender herself to the service of the valley. And if the summons of the sea had tormented her, it had been a bearable kind of pain, soothed by the song of safety that whispered eternally through Imladris.

But now, when she spoke to Rhossorieth, she felt power in her words. The ground beneath her feet stretched forward and out ahead of her, bidding her run. The crash of waves on distant shores deafened her with its urgent, passionate calls.

And yet, how profoundly she still felt for him, for the tenderness of his soft gray eyes, for the pensive furrow of his fine brow, for the sweet, low music of his voice. The prospect of bidding him goodbye weighed on her, almost heavily enough to sway her to remain. Almost.

On the first day of Fading,* Aearis found Elrond hard at work in his study, painstakingly reviewing plans for the new network of aqueducts with his tongue between his teeth. The familiar expression sent another pang of indecision through her, and she stopped a moment in the doorway to fix the image in her mind.

For a moment, she wondered if she might have chosen to stay if his feelings for her had been different. If he had loved her as a woman rather than a sister. But no, it was not so. If he had loved her more, she would have loved him less. Would have grown restless under the weight of it. Such was the perverse turning of her mind, that only love unfulfilled was worth having.

She cleared her throat softly. Then again, louder, when he remained transfixed by his labors. He looked up and smiled joyfully at the sight of her. Another pang, quieter but more painful than the last.

"My dear, your timing is impeccable!" he cried. "Please, come, take a seat."

"Impeccable?" she repeated, smiling despite herself. "I am gratified to hear it. Glorfindel says quite the opposite." She made to take a seat across his great mahogany desk, but he beckoned her to pull her chair around to sit beside him. Sitting so close to him, she was entranced by the fragrance of sage and athelas that always hung about his dark hair.

_Steel yourself, you swooning ninny, _she chided her disobedient heart.

Elrond pushed the schematics aside and drew out a fat book bound in soft, brilliantly-dyed viridian leather. It was engraved with a silver crest that set her heart aching with its long-forgotten familiarity: a ship with swelling sails, guided from above by a great sea-bird rising. The crest of the House of Andunie. She leafed through the book with trembling fingers, holding back tears so that they would not smudge the ink.

"I thought it might be wise to formally record all your innovations to the healing practices of my hall," said he, smiling at her speechless wonder. "In a mere seventy years, Aearis, you have pushed forward our methods in ways I never thought possible."

She traced her finger reverently over the perfect lettering, the beautiful illustrations.

"This is written in your own hand," she breathed, unable to lift her eyes from the lovingly crafted pages.

"I considered asking Faeleth to lend her services instead," he said, and she heard the smile in his voice, "for her script is far superior to mine. But she could not make out your shorthand."

"No," she replied absently, her mind still occupied entirely in admiration of the tome, "nor can I, when it comes to that."

She looked up only when she heard Elrond open the drawer and produce another book, almost identical to the first, save that the spine, where the title should have been, remained unmarked. She opened it and stared at the blank pages, heart sinking.

"For the next seventy years," she heard him say. There it was. The conversation that could no longer be postponed. Unwillingly, she raised her eyes to his, and found there some hint of understanding of what was to come.

"Elrond-" she started, but her voice was weak and cracked.

"You do not want to say it, child," he said, clasping her hand in that excruciatingly familiar gesture. "So don't. There is no reason that anything need change."

"Everything has already changed," she sighed. "Can't you see that?"

"Rhossorieth offers you glory and renown," he murmured, but she could hear the edge beneath his voice, "but she will not protect you as I will, Aearis."

"That is precisely why I must go with her," she replied, hardening her heart against his gentle onslaught. "Not for honor, not for fame, but because I cannot bear another moment's protection. Too long have I allowed myself to shelter in the respite of this valley."

"Children _need_ shelter," he insisted. Her pulse picked up suddenly, and she felt bitter words spring to her tongue. She pulled her hand away from his, too forcefully.

"If there were no other inducement to leave," she bit out, barely restraining her rising anger, "that alone would be reason enough. I am a child no longer, but still you see me so." The long-standing injury must have crept into her voice, because he gave her a pained, startled look.

"You have not yet completed your first _yen_,*" he said, reaching out again for her hand. But she stood quickly and backed away from him. "You have grown so much, Aearis, but why should you not find joy in your youth? Let older heads bear the burdens for a while longer."

"_Look _at me, Elrond," she pleaded, heart breaking at the fatherly concern in his eyes. "Have you ever really _looked _at me?"

He gazed at her wordlessly, confused and uncomprehending.

"Well?" She despised the cracking of her voice.

"What do you want me to say?" He was begging her to tell him what words would make her stay. For a moment, she felt frozen in place, the chilly air creeping deep under her skin and cooling the seething resentment that had leapt suddenly into flame.

She waited until she could once again trust her voice.

"I will be leaving with Lady Rhossorieth's party in the spring. You will have my report and recommendations concerning Therioril's progress and future training by week's end."

She turned and strode to the door silently, but his next words stopped her dead in her tracks.

"Gimlith is dying." In the thick, tenuous silence of the room, Elrond's grave voice cracked the air like a clap of thunder. Slowly, her fingers slipped from the door handle and she turned to face him again. He was standing now, but the weight of the world seemed balanced upon his slumping shoulders. He flinched back at her expression, for she made no effort to conceal her fury.

"What did you say?" The words hissed out between her teeth.

"She has not told you, for she feared that you would lose yourself in caring for her. But now you must know. Gimlith has been sick for many, many years."

Aearis actually found herself laughing at the absurdity of the statement. Her mother? Die? One might as well tell a stone to float.

"Dying. And I suppose that I, a healer, living with her day and night, simply missed the minor detail of a fatal ailment, did I?"

Elrond stared at her, eyes brimming with compassion and sadness. She felt her certainty quaver under his earnest gaze and looked away quickly before the doubt could take hold.

"Where do you think you got your powers of concealment if not from your mother, Aearis? You saw what you wanted to see, and she let you. Her sickness comes in waves-sometimes she is as hale as ever she was, even for years at a time. But it always returns eventually. When she is too ill to conceal it, she leaves your home on the pretext of solitary scouting missions. And now the interlude between the waves grows shorter each time, and I fear that the end is nigh."

She could not listen to this. His voice was strong and clear, and she heard the ring of truth in it.

So she ran.

She found her mother in the stables, vigorously brushing Angrebathor's fine coat and singing gently to soothe the animal. Daeroch's trysts with the lovely Imladris mares had produced several fine foals, each wilder and prouder than the last. The infusion of Numenorean stock into the herd of elegant elvish horses had produced an excellent breed, with the elegance and longevity of the Imladris line, the power and energy of the Mannish steeds, and the pride of both combined. Even among the Silvan elves, few possessed the iron will to bend the hybrid foals to their will. Last of Daeroch's children was a colt so profoundly black that light seemed to fall into him, and he was declared the finest horse ever born in the valley, for he was swift and clever, and so strong that the winter wolves that often antagonized the herd fled before the wrath of his trampling hooves. But so strong and intransigent was he that even Elrond's beastmaster threw up his arms in despair. Angrebathor, he was named, and he grew up wild, thundering through the vale as he pleased.

It was only after steady Daeroch's eyes closed for the last time that his prodigal son reappeared in the village, now full-grown, twenty hands high, and magnificent. He had approached Gimlith one day as she perused the latest weaponry at the blacksmith's stalls. Lady and steed had regarded each other silently, and though he dwarfed her small frame, he bowed his marvelous head to her. The elves present in the square for that meeting spoke often of it, for the Lady Gimlith had laid her small, delicate hand upon the steed's elegant brow, and from that day forward Angrebathor served her will with unflagging devotion. He would not suffer himself to be stabled with the other mounts, but he appeared there frequently to graciously accept grooming and feed from the terrified attendants, who muttered amongst themselves that he had the eyes of a dragon.

Aearis paused with several paces separating her from the pair of them, watching Gimlith's work with new scrutiny. Gimlith's motions were assured, decisive as ever, and her eyes glittered with the same unremitting energy as they always had. But, with eyes newly unveiled, Aearis saw what she had not been willing to see before. Beneath the nut-brown kiss of the sun on her mother's fine skin, a bloodless pallor had taken hold, leaving her lips and cheeks colorless where once they had bloomed like poppies. The mild exertion had brought sweat to her brow, and a subtle tremor to her once-steady hands. In anyone else, these signs might simply have been natural exhaustion. But Gimlith, who blazed with vitality and purpose, was flagging. She had the air of one holding her composure at great cost, a tension that lingered in the pitch of her narrow shoulders, the crease between her brows, the corners of her mouth.

So, it was true. Aearis sniffed the air, and for the first time she found herself face to face with the knowledge that she had so assiduously avoided. How long had the scent of death hung unmarked around her mother? How long had her willful ignorance permitted the illness to march forward unopposed? Had she really grown so selfish that she had-however unconsciously-treasured her own peace of mind over her mother's life?

Gimlith looked up from her work to meet her gaze, and Aearis saw understanding dawn in those dark eyes, closely followed by anger.

"Who told you?" Gimlith's throaty voice was gentle, but there was an edge in it.

"It does not matter," Aearis replied, keeping her voice steady only with extreme difficulty. "Except that it should have been you."

Between them, Angrebathor nickered reprovingly, casting his strange, intelligent stare at Aearis with a note of warning. Absently, Gimlith patted his muscled neck in a gesture of dismissal, and the great beast departed reluctantly, vanishing among the forest shadows as one of their own.

Once they were alone, Gimlith sighed deeply and slumped down upon a bench, passing a shaking hand over her eyes. Aearis moved forward instinctively to kneel beside her mother, clasping her always-cold hands. She felt the scar on Gimlith's palm where she had sliced it while cutting fruit.

_Fool. What kind of healer misses such obvious hints?_

"Why did you not tell me?" she asked, more gently now. "You know I can handle it. I handled it last time, and I am far better suited to the task now than I was then."

Gimlith's grip tightened enough to be slightly painful, but Aearis took comfort in the strength of those freezing hands.

"Azruari," she sighed, leaning forward to rest her forehead against her daughter's. "It is my greatest regret that your childhood was spent under the burden of my health. I should never have allowed you to waste your youth fighting my illness."

Aearis could not help but scoff at that.

"_Allowed_ it? We remember things quite differently." Gimlith shook her head, and Aearis felt her brow furrow.

"I could have stopped you," she insisted, "if my will had been stronger."

Aearis's derisive snort would have scandalized the finer ladies of Imladris, but it made her mother smile despite herself.

"Weakness of will, mother, has never been a deficit of yours. Bloody-mindedness, on the other hand…"

"An inherited trait, to be sure."

They lapsed into silence, comforted by the slight foray into jest. But the air was fraught with unspoken grief. Finally, when Aearis thought she could bear it no longer, Gimlith spoke again.

"It is not the same this time, my darling. My time is coming to a close, and in truth I would not have it otherwise. I am loved by a man who is kinder than summer. My daughters are grown, strong and beloved. My world is larger and more beautiful than it has ever been. What better exit could I desire?"

"But you are happy, mother. Why should that need to end?"

"End, my love? Who spoke of endings? Is that really what you believe of the fate of Men?"

Aearis hesitated, drawing away a few inches to study Gimlith's face again. Her expression was so peaceful, so at odds with her usual glinting ferocity.

"Those of the line of Elros are not meant to grow infirm," she whispered. "If you are ill, mother, it is due to an ailment of the fëa, not the hröa. Let me mend it. Let me make things as they ought to be."

To her surprise, Gimlith threw her head back and laughed. Laughed hard, though there was a sob in it.

"Bloody-mindedness indeed, to strive against the fact of mortality itself," she said. "There is no cure for what ails my spirit, Azruari. You must know this. The break happened long ago and by my own choice, and I always knew that someday I would succumb to it, as surely as an arrow to the heart."

"I healed you." Aearis could not keep herself from insisting, for desperation rose in her throat like bile. "After fa-" she caught herself, "The Singer-left, I found the cure in the songs of the sea. I sailed out westwards and begged the Valar to guide me, and they gave me the wisdom to repair what he broke."

"My dear, beloved little rogue," sighed Gimlith, and her voice was the sigh of trees, "surely you now understand why I was returned to you all those years ago. Glirron and I bonded for _life_, my darling, just much as any elven union, and our parting could only mean the end of mine. But you were not ready then. You called me back with the full force of your need, and I answered. For, more than anything, I am your mother, and I am bound to you until you can face the world alone."

"But Cestedir-"

"Cestedir has known me to my core since the first moment he laid eyes on me. He knew that I was dying before I knew it myself, and he chose to walk with me into my evening. If he can forgive my mortality, then I am confident that you can too."

Aearis was silent as she searched for her next argument, but she found nothing in her mother's beautiful, aging face to fight against. So she sat back on her heels and buried her face in her mother's lap, where her tears could fall without witness.

And so the year of that sweetest summer faded into a bitter winter, and the day of the Lindon detachment's departure grew nearer. Aearis remembered little of that winter, save the time she passed in the company of her small makeshift family. Bereneth had borne the news with unsurprising grace. But Aearis saw how the fading of the only mother the orphan had ever found was compounded with the death of Runhilde to drive Bereneth deep into silent despair. There was a silent tearing behind those beautiful gray eyes, lonely and inexpressibly painful.

Indeed, among the four of them, only Cestedir seemed unchanged. The only alteration in him came from Aearis's own perception. Previously, she had liked him for his open, unpretending manner, his blunt wit, and, most importantly, his perfect and inexhaustible devotion to Gimlith. Now she fancied that she could see closer to the heart of him. His plain exterior seemed stripped away, leaving a being that glittered with ancient kindness and emanated rays of warm, soothing light. She basked in his goodness, for it had the power to drive the chill temporarily from her bones and bring a fleeting peace to the tumult of grief and rage and fear that churned at the core of her.

_This _was what a father should be. Gentle and steady when no one else could be, a guiding light where darkness threatened to overwhelm. She turned towards him, dearest and most humble of all elves, and he spoke to her in the same voice that he always had. But now she heard the music behind the hoarse sound, and the wisdom in the jest.

On the darkest day of that winter, a day when she found herself so totally unmade by her grief that she could scarcely lift her eyes from the ground, he gave her a book, small, slim, and bound in worn brown leather. It bore neither title nor author, but in her hands it seemed to sing with its own whispering voice. The pages were so old that Aearis feared that they would crumble to dust under her fingers, but they withstood as she leafed through it, struggling with the old dialect which mixed Quenya and Sindarin with infuriating indiscretion.

"I thought you might like to translate it," said Cestedir with a crooked smile. "Practice your dead languages a bit." She had raised a brow at him, unsure of why he thought it necessary to assign her new studies. But she trusted him, perhaps more now than any other being on the earth. He simply shrugged, and, by way of explanation, said: "It is the work of an old friend of mine, reckoned rather wise for a Noldo. I haven't the talent for words to transcribe it into Sindarin myself."

It was good enough for her. Between shifts in the healing halls and reluctant appearances in the Halls of Fire, she set to her painstaking work, equipped with a large stack of Quenya tomes and an incomplete dictionary. The little book chronicled a conversation between a mortal woman and an elven philosopher king.* She found her hand trembling as she wrote, for the wise-woman in the book seemed to speak all the thoughts that embittered Aearis's own heart. The wrongness, the injustice of death, the intolerable uncertainty of the doom of Men.

But the task, which busied her mind and her hands, also served to lighten some of the weight that pressed down on her with crushing force. And even as the winter lifted slowly to grudgingly permit the first stirrings of spring, so too did Gimlith's old energy seem to return in response to Aearis's dedicated ministrations. So hope bloomed again, and Aearis chose not to check the swelling of it in her heart.

So, she had been right after all. Death did not come naturally to one such as Gimlith of Andunie. It was all very simple, if one knew what one was doing.

Spring dawned pale and cold upon the valley, but the songbirds had returned and the brambles bloomed energetically at the first tender touch of sunlight. And so, since the ground was hard and the air was clear, and a warm wind blew in from the south, it was decided that Lady Rhossorieth and her party would ride out immediately. Of the elves who had come with the Lindon party, Erestor of Mithlond alone was to remain behind, for his involvement in the construction of the aqueducts had expanded to a complete overhaul of the agricultural infrastructure of the valley. Noenor was to be dispatched to Lindon in his stead, for Cirdan relied heavily on Erestor's counsel, and a trade seemed both fair and conducive to more frequent contact between Lindon and Imladris. Faeleth had made no secret of her displeasure at her husband's departure, but Erestor assured her that his work would be soon completed and the exchange quickly reversed.

For her part, Aearis found herself much occupied with preparations for their departure. Therioril, her young apprentice, had begged her tearfully to remain at teach her, so earnestly that Aearis found her will wavering for a moment. But once the girl was comfortably situated with Halloth as her new teacher, the weeping was considerably reduced, and Aearis set to work untangling herself from Imladris. Reports were to be written, farewell fetes attended, and Lindir comforted.

"You are a heartless little witch," he sniffed tearfully on the eve of her departure, hugging her far too tightly for breathing. "Who will be my duet partner now? And how am I to face the gossip alone? You know everyone shall think you jilted me."

"I will tell anyone who asks," she replied archly, "that it was _you _who jilted _me_, for writing songs in a horrid meter."

Lindir laughed and hiccuped simultaneously, shaking them both where they stood.

"I will miss you, little one," he sighed, his wondrous voice even more beautiful for the sadness in it.

"What a pretty liar you are!" she exclaimed, attempting to force the conversation back to levity. "You shall miss my songs, perhaps. And my willingness to give you all the best harmonies." But he merely unleashed another of his deep, shuddering, soulful sighs and shook his head where it rested upon hers. The knowledge of his pure, disinterested affection warmed her, and she squeezed him tightly in return. "I will miss you too, dear friend. But look for my letters, for I shall send you all the music I find on my way, wherever I am going."

"Promises, promises," scoffed the minstrel, finally releasing her to wipe the tears from his wide, long-lashed brown eyes. Then he picked up his lute and went on his way with a poetically melancholy droop to his shoulders, plucking out a sweet, sad tune that Aearis would remember for the rest of her days.

In the end, there were few other goodbyes for Aearis to say. Bereneth, in the performance of her duties as Rhossorieth's personal escort and guard within Imladris, had left so strong an impression upon the noble lady that she had been invited to accompany the party back to Lindon for a season in court. The request was made in such a way that no refusal was possible, and indeed came as welcome permission for Bereneth to follow Aearis and leave behind the phantoms that haunted her in Imladris. Cestedir and Gimlith had assented to join them for a brief trip, for Gimlith longed for the sea and Cestedir was not one to refuse her anything. So, with some amusement, Rhossorieth welcomed the whole family to join her party, seemingly pleased by the acquisition.

On the morning of their departure, Rhossorieth's traveling companions assembled outside the northern wall of Imladris, awaiting their final member, for Glorfindel had not yet joined them. Gimlith, huddled and shivering in the chilly spring morning, muttered Adunaic profanities under her breath.

"Really, mother," chided Aearis, "you must learn some patience. You know how long it takes him to comb all that hair."

She was spared her mother's sharp retort, for Elrond walked out to bid them farewell. Relations had been strained and awkward since that day in his study, but Aearis could not help looking upon him with gratitude and affection. He had cared for her mother for many long years while she herself remained carefree, and had broken his policy of total confidentiality to alert her of her mother's illness. After all, if he had not flouted this most sacred of rules of his house, she might not have discovered the truth in time to save her mother.

Elrond's farewells were handsome and generous, recognizing each of the party and thanking them for their individual contributions. Aearis saw the backs of the Lindon guards straighten with pride, their glinting eyes soften at the graciousness of their host. Gifts of miruvoir and pretty trinkets were exchanged. But for Aearis and Bereneth, he had brought even better.

"To you, Bereneth Amathiel, shieldmaiden, I present Cuvalthorn," he said, ushering forward Feldir, the sheepish, kind-faced youth who still blushed so prettily at even a glance from Aearis. The strapping young guard carried a mighty, unstrung bow carved with the twisting vines of Imladris. It was crafted from bright silver wood, thick and powerful, nearly as long as Aearis was tall. "Few now can wield it, but yours is a strong arm and a stronger heart, and if any will shall bend it, let it be yours."

Bereneth dismounted Alassir and took the bow from Feldir. She examined the weapon carefully, running her long, beautiful fingers along its curves with the gentle passion of a lover. With words of quiet, fervent thanks, she kissed Elrond's hand and bowed before him, deeply affected. He smiled and kissed her fair brow.

"String it when your need is great," said he, "and it shall answer your call." Next he turned to Aearis, who found herself once again breathless and speechless before him. "And for Aearis Gwingien, what gift can express my feelings? As wise as she is reckless, as clever as she is foolish, as kind as she is stubborn, as loving as she is restless. I thought long and hard, dear friend, of what I could yet offer you, and it came to me. Always, I have treasured your hands, for they bring life, and succor, and music. So here," he said, and she received the small bundle from him in perplexity. "May your hands remain ever soft and kind."

Aearis opened the carefully folded cloth to find a pair of black gloves. They seemed to be crafted of fine, soft leather, but when she pulled them on they were perfectly pliable, conforming to the motions of her hands as seamlessly as her own skin. And yet, they were strong as light armor bracers, and she could feel Elrond's particular kind of subtle, protective magic flowing through them.

She bowed low to him, lingering there to conceal the misting of her eyes.

"In all things, I shall strive to bring honor to you, dearest teacher," she promised. And she meant it.

He clasped her gloved hands and bid her rise, and his gaze was a warm, starry twilight. Then he drew her away from Rhossorieth's party, drawing curious looks from the traveling companions as they retreated out of earshot.

"I have no doubt that you will always be a source of great pride for me, Aearis," he replied. Though he smiled, his voice was profoundly sad. "But still I wish that I could protect you for a few seasons more. Yet you are grown, and now you must defend what is yours." A shadow fell over his face, and he shivered. "I see that soon you will find yourself more alone than you have ever been. Accept kindness where you can find it, Aearis, for even you cannot brave the world alone."

The faint resonance in his voice chilled her, and she sought for the source of his sudden preoccupation.

"Tell me what worries you, Elrond," she prompted gently, knowing that to pry to aggressively would drive away the new glimmer of honesty between them. He searched her face-for what, she did not know. Then, to her utter confusion and delight, he drew her into an embrace unlike any he had ever bestowed upon her before. It was not the touch of an older brother or an affectionate mentor. This was the way a man held a woman-tender and uncertain, all beating hearts and breathless expectation.

"Perhaps neither of us can claim impeccable timing," he murmured in her ear. "But if you must go, go with with knowledge that I have seen you, properly. Is it too late to tell you how beautiful you are?"

She pulled away slowly, willing herself to smile through the sharp bite of the cold air that rushed in between them. Then, as though from miles away, she heard the twinkling song of seven silver bells, like stars bursting out over a dark sky. The world was filled with soft light as she raised her eyes to see Glorfindel on his proud white stallion. The harmony of Runhilde's bells was like sunlight on frostbitten fingers, and Aearis breathed a little as the glowing golden warrior rode up the road to join the travelers.

"Forgive my lateness," he called, and his voice was like the first kiss of summer. Elrond's words fled from her mind like a half-remembered dream. Through her relief, Aearis noted that Glorfindel's full, generous lips were rather swollen, his hair charmingly mussed. It was with no small effort that she stamped down several unflattering thoughts about Counsellor Ruineth. What right had she to resent his trysts?

Still, it was with a distinctly bittersweet twisting of the heart that Aearis left the vale, the exhilaration mingling strangely with sorrow for what was, and could never be again.

The party moved slowly, for Rhossorieth's guards were vigilant and ever insistent on scouting each stretch of road before they set forth each morning. But Aearis's heart swelled at the sight of the path that stretched endlessly out before her, and often she galloped out ahead, with Bereneth and Dinalagos hot on her heels.

The nights were merry and bright with music, and Aearis discovered to her delight that Noenor's singing voice was unexpectedly lovely. Of course, he could not match Bereneth or Glorfindel as a duet partner, but Bereneth rarely sang anymore, and Glorfindel carefully absented himself whenever the music began. So, Aearis amused herself as best she could, and let the giddy excitement of the road distract her from the tightly-strung anxiety that constricted her breath in quiet moments.

On the fifth day out of Imladris, the day that they expected to arrive at the borders of Lindon, a dense fog settled over the traveling party, quickly followed by a chilly, penetrating rain. Cestedir rode out at dawn leading three other soldiers to scout the road ahead, leaving the rest to shelter in a small clearing near the river Lhun, where the branches of great willows provided partial shelter.

Lady Rhossorieth requested-so graciously that Aearis almost forgot that it was really a command-a traveling song to lift their spirits. Noenor joined her in a rousing, slightly raunchy sailor's song, soon followed by Gimlith and a few of the less inhibited of the Lindon guards.

The morning passed easily as they awaited the return of the scouting party, and only too late did they begin to worry.

Glorfindel was the first to express concern. He had nodded along with a pleasant smile at the morning's lighthearted festivities, but as morning grew old, his eyes began to wander restlessly westwards, and he paced along the river bank. Gimlith and Rhossorieth joined him presently, and the three began conversing in urgent whispers. The mist pressed inwards upon them, blocking their sight beyond ten paces.

Aearis dropped out of the song as Bereneth left the fire side to join them, her ears clearly pricked to listen.

"I hear little," Bereneth was saying quietly. "Less than I should. Something is amiss."

Her pulse thundering in her ears, Aearis addressed a gentle entreaty to the piercing rain, to bring her news of the lands around. The answering murmur of the water filled her ears, telling her of the politics of the oaks, the territorial disputes of rabbits, the latest trickery of a particularly industrious fox. Of trampled flowers and scarred trees, blood-soaked grass and-

She gasped and her right hand flew to Echiar.

"What do you hear, child?" Rhossorieth's voice was clear and perfectly calm, but her eyes were piercing enough to break through to Aearis as she stood in the thrall of the rain.

"Goblins, ripping and rending. Wargs, hunting all that walks. And someone else. He whispers, and his voice is poison."

The lady's bright eyes narrowed. Instantly, she was transformed from a fine and tranquil noblewoman to a hard, shrewd commander. She directed her men with silent gestures and flicks of her fingers, and they jerked into action like puppets, creating a protective formation around the rest of the party.

"Cestedir is still out there with your men," hissed Gimlith, her knuckles white as she gripped her sword. "I will not cower behind closed ranks while my husband claims all the death and glory for himself."

"What do you propose?" Rhossorieth replied in kind, eyes flashing brighter than the sapphire at her brow. "To charge out into the mist alone would be suicide. You are here under _my _protection, Lady Gimlith, and I would be remiss if I allowed you to die so stupidly."

Aearis could not help interjecting her opinion, galled by her mother's utter carelessness. Cured she may be, but to ride into battle in her weakened state? It was downright inconsiderate.

"You have no business charging for either death _or _glory at present, mother. Indeed, as your physician, I forbid it."

Gimlith threw her an incredulous look.

"I am as hale as ever I was, thanks to you," she replied, though her tone did not match the gratitude of the words. "What use is my health if I am not permitted to be useful?"

"If a physician cannot convince you, then let the word of your daughter stay your hand. Do not leave me in such misery by riding into danger."

"Rest assured, Aearis," said Glorfindel, joining the conversation unexpectedly. He had spoken so little on the journey so far that Aearis had become quite unaccustomed to his voice. It was even lovelier than she remembered. "At the very least, she will not ride alone." He turned to bow deeply to Gimlith, his hand resting upon his sword. "Permit me to ride with you, my lady, for Cestedir is dear to me as well."

"But you must stay and protect the civilians," Gimlith protested. "Someone must lead the guards if danger strikes."

"Bereneth can lead the men as adeptly as I myself could. And indeed I doubt that any combat shall be necessary, for Aearis is more than capable of concealing our party from goblins and wargs."

Despite the dire circumstances, Aearis glowed with pride at Glorfindel's confidence in her.

"He speaks truly, Lady Rhossorieth," she volunteered, meeting the appraising blue stare with as much confidence as she could convince herself to feel. "In the mist and rain, I can easily shield us from Man or beast."

Rhossorieth turned to glance at Bereneth, who nodded in response to her unspoken question.

And, just like that, it was decided. Rhossorieth retained the nine guards, and Gimlith and Glorfindel prepared to ride out after the scouting party. Aearis's heart leapt into her throat at the sight of her mother, dark and glorious on her great mount, bound for glory. She did not look small, or fragile, or tired then, and hope sprung in Aearis's breast. But still she could not restrain herself from catching her mother's hand and pressing a kiss to it.

"Come back soon," she choked out, gazing into those flashing, glittering eyes, memorizing every line and lash. "Come back safe." Gimlith smiled, and she was young, and strong, and fearless.

"Take care of your sister."

Then they vanished into the pressing mist.

Hours seemed to pass, but they might only have been minutes or seconds. Aearis's voice rose in song, strengthened by Rhossorieth's and Noenor's. The great lady's voice was deep and cool, but it thrummed with quiet power that seemed to shake the earth itself. Noenor's was sweet and soft, and it fortified her heart against the creeping fear that brushed its fingers lightly over the nape of her neck. With a quiet song of concealment, she wove a fortress of rain and mist, where any orc who thought to enter would find itself turned around, confused, drawn in some other direction. She set her voice echoing through the air like a capricious breeze, distracting and soothing. To her left, Dinalagos sat at attention, hackles raised. She tangled one hand in his patchy fur, and his warm solidity steadied her. Bereneth stood to her right, stock-still, eyes closed, her slender hunting bow held loosely in her right hand, Aearis's fingers clasped in her left.

And so, they waited, and Aearis became aware of the snarling, mutilated sounds of hideous creatures straying along the boundary of her circle of protection. A few of the braver, cleverer creatures struggled harder against the whispering defenses, and she repelled them, patiently leading them into confusion and fear. Their anger mounted, and she felt it as they turned upon each other, and her taunts stoked the conflicts into flame. The rain sang to her of their blood spilling on the ground, their heads rolling under the feet of their brethren. Finally, even Bereneth could hear no more of the foul creatures.

Yet their champions had not returned, and a knot twisted Aearis's stomach as they waited. But she sang on, for what else could she do?

Struggling as she was to conquer her own terror, it took her some time to notice the new voice that joined in her song, sowing discordant notes. It had woven its way into the harmony, slithering around the corners of her mind, until suddenly she felt her fëa crack. The elements rebelled against her gentle guidance, searing pain behind her eyes blinded her, and the circle of safety shattered around them. For a moment, the elves remained frozen in place, incapacitated by the agony of the splintering song.

They watched, horrorstruck, as the billowing mist seemed to darken and twist into a ghostly figure woven of shadow, riding towards them upon a brutal black steed. Behind it followed a shrieking, chittering horde of malformed creatures: hungry-eyed goblins with long, cruel blades and quivers of tar-black arrows, demonic wolves with scarred muzzles and curled lips, great scuttling spiders that dripped venom from their long fangs.

Then, a familiar song brought Aearis back to her senses. The whistle of an elven arrow, true and tuneful. Then another, and another, as Bereneth nocked and released her arrows with unerring precision. Goblins shrieked and fell, wargs toppled to the ground with arrows embedded deep between their yellow eyes. But the Shadow brushed aside Bereneth's arrows as though they were made of paper, and its advance did not falter.

"Aearis, no matter what happens now, you _must _stay with Lady Rhossorieth." Bereneth's voice was so clear and commanding that Aearis could scarcely recognize it.

"What are you going to do?" she hissed, desperately worried that her friend was planning something extraordinarily brave and stupid. Bereneth spared her a smile before spurring Alassir forward with a cry. The remaining soldiers followed her with cries of their own, and the small company of luminous figures charged into the roiling mass of deformed limbs and ghoulish faces.

Aearis tried to raise her voice in a song of protection, but to her horror she found her fea locked and strangled by the Shadow's vicious song. But the sight of Bereneth, bright and fearless against the advancing darkness, sent an electric jolt straight through Aearis's heart.

_Take care of your sister._

And, though her voice still failed her, she drew from the pocket of her traveling cloak the little silver flute.

A song of silver rang out through the clearing, and Aearis felt rather than saw the swelling of Bereneth's fea. Rhossorieth's bow twanged rhythmically behind her, and each silvery arrow found its place in the throat of another goblin. Against all the odds, that small elvish company held the line, driving back the hideous attackers. And Bereneth herself engaged the Shadow, and it faltered before her. Its hissing, venomous song stopped, and Aearis felt the iron heel grinding down upon her fëa relent.

The slender shieldmaiden raised her sword, and the Shadow brought up its own fell, twisted saber to meet it. And Aearis threw her voice into the horde and stirred them into frothing madness and confusion, and the weakest-willed of them crumpled to the ground in paralyzed terror.

But Bereneth was surrounded in a sea of brutal enemies, and they hewed Alassir beneath her. She leapt free, raising her sword just in time to parry yet another crushing blow of the Shadow's blade, and the faithful Imladris steel buckled and broke. But still she fought, dodging between the fell creature's blows with perfect precision.

But they were many and she was one, and the Shadow pressed its advantage. Aearis drew Aegros and Echiar from her belt and made to charge towards her beleaguered friend, with little room for any thought of duty or strategy. But just as she leapt onto Alphear's back, the Shadow froze as a new sound reached them-the galloping of great hooves. The horde parted in chaos before the trampling horse and his rider, whose Numenorean blade swept through them in bright arcs. Angrebathor reared with a resounding battle scream, and upon his back Gimlith glittered in the gray light, cutting her way through the goblins until she reached the Shadow.

Their swords met with a crack like thunder, and, fighting his way through the roiling mass of bodies, Cestedir came into view with two other soldiers, looking much the worse for wear. They drove the creatures back, leaving Bereneth shaking, but alive, with her broken weapons clutched in her hand.

But more came, swarming from the swamps to the north, a dark pestilence that soiled and consumed all it touched.

Gimlith turned her head and fixed Aearis with a steady dark stare.

"Aearis," she called, and her voice rang out over the distance between them with perfect clarity. "Take the others and run." Aearis hesitated, bound in place by the flagging strength in her mother's hoarse voice. _"Run."_

The command in Gimlith's voice snapped through Aearis's resistance instantly, as it always did. With a heavy weight on her heart, she abandoned her song.

"We must retreat, my lady," she called to Rhossorieth through the din of the battle. "We will make for the crossing and beg the river's protection."

Lady Rhossorieth fixed her with a flashing stare for a moment, then nodded gravely. She gestured to the rest of the Lindon counsellors, and they rode for the river with Aearis, Dinalagos, and Noenor at the rear.

As they retreated, Aearis heard, clearly through the din, the song of seven silver bells. She turned back. As though the clouds had parted to reveal the sun, a shining figure charged through the dark forces with sword drawn and voice raised in a rending battle cry. He wore no helmet, and his lustrous golden mane fell loose around his shoulders like yellow flames. His teeth were bared, his bright eyes glowed with pure predatory ferocity. With each perfect motion, he brought death raining down on the foul horde-he was unfaltering, magnificent, _merciless. _A bone-deep shudder ran through her body at the sight of him. It thrilled and terrified her in equal measure to see her sweet, gentle champion so transformed.

Then her eyes strayed back to the two dark figures that clashed in the midst of the battle. They fought on in a perfect stalemate, matching each other blow for vicious blow. But the Shadow's energy never seemed to diminish, and Aearis could see even from the silhouette of her mother's form that she could not fight forever.

And even as she watched, Gimlith's strength failed her, just for a moment. Her sword arm buckled, and the Shadow's blade came crashing down upon her shoulder, crumpling her armor. The sword nearly fell from her hand and she slumped forward in pain, but she fought on.

"Aearis," Noenor urged, but his voice seemed tinny and irrelevant, "Aearis, we must go. Who will protect Counsellor Rhossorieth? Aearis!"

She shook herself, willing her eyes away from the carnage. Glorfindel was there. He would protect her.

So, she wheeled around to follow Noenor into the mist. But even as she turned her gaze to him, his body jerked convulsively and his hand flew to his chest, where a gnarled black arrow had sprouted suddenly. One of the creatures had seen them retreating, and it had its bow trained upon them.

Without thought or reason, Aearis pulled Noenor onto Alphear, just as another arrow pierced his horse's eye. They rode frantically for the river, where Rhossorieth and the others had just crossed to the other side. But, like a chill in the air, she felt it behind her. A poisonous warping of the world, that sang a song of terror and despair. The Shadow's song crept down her throat like a frigid hand, sinking its claws deep into the core of her. Feet from the river, she wheeled around, and there it was. Black and empty as a hole in the fabric of Arda-a yawning, hungry gash.

Alphear was a faithful horse, but he had a skittish temper and a sensitive disposition. He screamed as the poison song reached him, throwing off his riders and hurling himself into the river in a fit of madness. Sprawled upon the riverbank, Aearis heard his final cries as her beloved steed was dashed to pieces upon the rocks. Her body ached and her head was splitting, no air seemed to reach her lungs. Then, through the fog that filled her tortured mind, she felt hot air upon her face and an insistent force pushing beneath her her back and lifting her.

"Hush, Dinalagos. I'm tired," she muttered, raising a heavy hand to bat at the dog's invasive snout. But his pushing became more insistent, and suddenly Aearis could hear the song of the river again. The Lhun sang a different song than the boisterous, cheerful Bruinen. Lhun was ardent, impetuous, and a little cruel. It spoiled for a fight, cried out for adventure, longed for the sea. Its ringing voice raced through her blood like a fever, and she found her hands leaping to her blades even as she rose to her feet. The long daggers sang in her hands, thirsting for blood, and she sang with them, for her voice returned with a rush of energy. The river rose to meet her voice, sweeping away the small bridge that Rhossorieth and the others had crossed.

"_No escape for you now, little bastard,_" said the poison voice, a resonant hissing sound that sent a shudder through Aearis's spine. It was not an ugly voice, precisely. But it was horribly persuasive, overpowering, and it filled her mind with dreadful, confusing images.

"No escape for either of us," she replied. The sound the Shadow emitted tore the air with its jagged cruelty. It was laughing.

"_Such charming hubris. A daughter of Numenor indeed, though your blood be tainted by mingling with the Others._"

Despite herself, Aearis found her curiosity inconveniently piqued. Could this shadowy being be a Man?

"Who are you?" she asked before she could stop herself. Her eyes were drawn irresistibly into the billowing abyss beneath the Shadow's black hood. It seemed infinitely deep, undeniably _fascinating._

The strange, rending laughter rang out again.

"_A name for a name, half-elf. Tell me who you are, and perhaps I shall oblige you in turn._"

Even under the mesmeric sway of the Shadow, Aearis knew immediately that to give this being her name would be a worse than fatal mistake. Distantly, she recalled the deep, rich voice counseling her: _"Tell your true name to no one, save those you trust entirely. For there is great power in a name, and you never know who may call out to you."_

And even the memory of that voice seemed to strengthen her, for the Shadow's power shrank back from her, releasing its insidious grasp on her fëa. And as it retreated she felt herself spurred to action. In an instant she had leapt upon the back of unshakeable Dinalagos, who stood beside her with his hackles raised and his lip curled back. As soon as she sat astride him, the great hound leapt forward and swiped with his great paws at the tall, twisted black steed that bore the Shadow. The horse reared and trampled at Dinalagos, evading the dog's great, crushing jaws. They circled each other, striking and retreating.

The Shadow's reach, with its longer arm and great sword, greatly outmatched Aearis's, but its mount was growing panicky, and the slashing of her daggers and the snapping of her hound's teeth were driving it further and further towards terrified madness. She had no doubt that the Shadow's blade would pierce her before long, but with any luck the delay at least would allow Rhossorieth to reach the outposts of Lindon and call for aid for the rest of the soldiers still fighting in the clearing. Her family, at least, could be saved if help came in time. So she fought desperately, eluding the blows of the dark sword so narrowly that she could feel the freezing cold of the blade on her skin.

She knew not for how long they stayed in their macabre dance of death delayed, but, as her luck began to wane, she heard a cry from the direction of the trees. Blazing, blinding, he burst out of the mist upon his white steed. Behind him sat Bereneth, and she leapt from the horse's back with Cuvalthorn, the Man-sized silver bow, steady in her hand. Aearis's heart leapt as, with a single, mighty motion, Bereneth strung the great bow.

Aearis heard it sing out its bloodthirsty joy that finally, after so many years, it had once again found a master worth serving. Bereneth's arrows whistled past her; one glanced off the Shadow's shoulder, another knocked the sword from its hand, and the third pierced the chest of the fell steed that bore it. The dark rider shrieked in fury and pain as Dinalagos surged forward to sink his teeth into the horse's throat and the creature crumpled to the ground. Then the Shadow had regained its feet, and it was tall and menacing and its sword remained unbroken. But Glorfindel reached them as it aimed a great blow at Dinalagos, and the Shadow melted back from him with a wail. Back it fled, into the forests behind them, shrinking from the shining warrior like a nightmare at the touch of daylight.

Aearis wheeled around, scanning the forests for the next onslaught, but none came. Bereneth approached, her face streaked with dark blood, her armor scratched and sullied, but with eyes blazing with the heat of battle.

"Peace, Aearis," she murmured, stretching out a hand to help Aearis side of Dinalagos. "The day is won, though at great cost."

Aearis registered little of Bereneth's words, but she allowed the taller girl to pull her into a tight, rib-crushing embrace. She stood docile for a time, but something of what Bereneth was murmuring reminded her…

_Noenor._

She broke loose and made for the riverbank, where a single figure in muddy robes that might once have been the deep, rich violet of an Imladris counselor, lay face down in the reeds. When she flipped the body over, the face was strange. Blank. Empty.

Its long, sharp nose she thought she recognized, and the blue of its dull eyes seemed strangely familiar. But this cold, stiff thing was not anything she knew or understood. It was not her friend, her favorite librarian, the father of the child she had delivered. It was simply Dead.

Beside her, Bereneth sighed deeply and stroked her hair, as though in an attempt to offer comfort. Comfort for what, she could not think. Bereneth hoisted the dead thing onto Dinalagos's back and they walked together back to the battleground.

Her eyes swept over the field of carnage, hardly able to make sense of the tangled mass of hewed limbs and twisted bodies. Finally her eyes alighted on a figure she recognized. Cestedir, kneeling in the middle of the field. Was he badly injured? Absently, Aearis noticed that Bereneth had wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her close.

Again she struggled free from her friend's grip and ran to Cestedir, skipping over the dead with such detachment that she might have surprised herself, had she been capable of surprise in that moment.

Because Cestedir was not injured, at least not seriously. Yet, he was on his knees, cradling a small figure to his chest. Something dark and silken spilled over his arms, glittering with small silver pinpricks. She stared at the thing in his arms. Watched curiously as he covered it with kisses. It was a small thing, and fragile. Its eyes were wide open and dull, dark and vacant. A deep, gaping hole yawned in its chest and the red blood that blossomed from the wound had already begun to darken.

She stood before the rough-hewn captain, watching him clutch at the dead thing, bathe it with tears, shudder with silent sobs.

Distantly, she noted that someone had taken her hand. But she neither turned nor spoke. The world was perfectly soundless. It was smaller, too, and empty, save for her and the dead thing.

She lingered there, in the hollow black world, attentively watching the dead thing. It neither moved nor spoke. An impressive commitment to its part, thought Aearis.

But something was niggling at her, tugging her away from her peaceful void. It was hot and salty, and its piteous cries cut through her precious silence.

"I am sorry," she told the dead thing as courteously as possible. "But I have the strangest feeling that I am forgetting something."

She turned and stared through the darkness for the source of those quiet, peace-shattering cries. Bereneth was crumpled on her knees beside her, face cradled in her hands, rocking back and forth.

_Take care of your sister, _the dead thing reminded her, gently.

"But I'm not finished talking to you yet," she replied, though it seemed unsporting to disagree with a corpse.

The dead thing just stared.

With a deep, resigned sigh, Aearis knelt beside Bereneth and wrapped her fingers firmly around her wrists. Slowly, the girl lowered her hands, letting them sit limp upon her knees, and raised her gray eyes. Aearis reeled at the devastating force of feeling in that overflowing gaze, flinched away from the sorrow and horror that spilled over her like warm blood. It repelled and fascinated her, confusing and incomprehensible.

"I am so sorry, my darling," gasped Bereneth in a strange, trembling voice. "If I had been quicker-if I had killed that-it should have been me, not-" She was babbling, nonsensical, pleading for absolution for something Aearis could not understand, _refused _to understand. So she drew Bereneth close, pressing her against her chest and willing the hopeless sobs that racked her body to stop. She stroked the soft auburn hair mechanically, pressed her cold lips against the white skin.

And the next several hours passed in the same numb haze. Glorfindel returned with news that Rhossorieth and the other counselors had reached Mithlond safely. He gave his report in a calm, authoritative voice, but his eyes remained fixed on Aearis as he spoke, and she found herself irritated and provoked by the boundless sadness with which he gazed at her.

Everyone seemed so terribly concerned about the dead things, though Aearis could not think why. They did not seem to be hurting anyone. So instead she turned her attention to dressing the wounds of the rest of the soldiers. One had taken a deep slash to his stomach, and she set to work on him first. Her hands worked of their own accord, but she found to her mild displeasure that the usual songs of healing died in her throat. Not a single note could she summon to her lips-her fëa had fallen silent.

Then, behind her, a voice swelled deep and powerful, ringing through her with blazing, unbearable heat. The bright golden spirit stretched out to entwine hers. And in it she felt compassion and love, and _fuck _it hurt.

But the soldier was healing, reviving, light returning to his lovely eyes. So she let her hands work as the Other burned through her, waking her slumbering fëa with his intolerably bright light. When she had finished treating the last wound, a deep gash in Dinalagos's shoulder, she turned around to face the blinding golden spirit. If he had been terrible in battle, somehow he seemed even more so in mercy. He was looking at her with unbearably kind eyes. Sympathizing with sorrow that she absolutely _would not feel._

But she could not break the hold of his gaze, and to her horror she felt tears beginning behind her eyes.

_Absolutely bloody not. _

A warm, velvety touch at the crook of her neck allowed her to turn away from that mesmerizing stare, and she looked up to find a shadowy black steed at her shoulder. Angrebathor's fathomless, liquid eyes fixed upon hers.

The uppity bastard of a horse had never allowed her to stand so close before. He only tolerated her mo-

Aearis backed away from him, but he followed.

"Please go," she pleaded as he advanced. "You don't belong to me. I'm not ready."

He stopped several paces from her, considering her carefully. He whinnied softly and bowed his marvelous head. Trembling, she closed the distance and, with shaking hands, cut away the saddle that sat empty upon his back. Then he turned, and vanished into the mist like a dream.

That was the breaking of the dam. As Angrebathor, riderless, melted away into the fading twilight, the truth of the situation breached the glassy surface of her dead calm. And she shattered.

* * *

**Author's note:**

*Fading: The elven season when fall fades into winter

*yen: An elven unit of time comprising 144 lunar years. For the purposes of this story, I'm setting the elven age of majority (physical maturity) at 100 lunar years, with a full yen counting as a sort of unofficial rite of passage.

*The conversation I'm referring to is "Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth," a dialogue between King Finrod and a mortal wisewoman, Andreth. It's a sort of Socratic dialogue on the topic of mortality that I highly recommend. It was published in Morgoth's Ring, but it's also easy to find online.


	15. The Land of Music

Author's note: Hello! Apologies again for the long delay-I rewrote this chapter about four times and it still annoys me, but there we are.

Thank you as ever to my wonderful reviewers. Without your kind, motivating comments, it would have been infinitely more difficult to find the determination to write this chapter.

* * *

"How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard."

-A.A. Milne

Gimlith died a mere hour's travel from the sea. Indeed, if the day had been clearer, one could have seen the glimmer of the western shore from the hill where they buried her.

Hers was a quiet funeral. Cestedir dug the grave deep, working with a makeshift wooden shovel through the night, accepting no help from either Glorfindel or Bereneth when they offered. Itching with restless energy, Glorfindel set instead to his own self-appointed task. He and Bereneth rode all the way to the coast to find the right stone-a long, man-sized, dark gray boulder, smoothed by centuries of the ebb and flow of tides, glittering subtly under the light.

Sitting there upon the sand he carved, letting the pillar within reveal its form to his searching hands. It emerged a whirl of motion, a woman with flaring hair and defiant posture, sprung from the earth and reaching towards the sky. Despite Bereneth's protestations, he carried the statue to the burial site on his back, the straining of his muscles temporarily driving out the feeling of tormenting uselessness that dogged his steps.

The funerals passed quickly and with few words, for none seemed quite able to find the words to express the horror of the losses they had suffered. Bereneth sang the single harmony of the beacon from Gimlith's wedding lay, casting several hopeful looks to where Aearis stood motionless before her mother's grave. But Aearis stayed silent, her eyes fixed away to the west, where the sea might be. She stayed long after the others had drifted away. Glorfindel watched the hill top for a while-two figures, one stone-still and erect, one trembling like a leaf in violent wind even in the warm noontide sun.

Every nerve in his body screamed at him to run to her, to wrap that fragile, shaking frame in his arms, to fill her to the top with love and leave no room for grief. And if he had been younger, stupider, vainer, he might have tried it. But he was not such a fool as that… surely, not such a damned silly, sentimental fool-

She did not turn as he joined her at the crest of the hill. Her eyes still settled westwards, out over the impenetrable mist that still hid the shore.

"This is all wrong," she muttered, her voice so quiet and toneless that she might have been talking in her sleep. Lost for words, Glorfindel stood beside her quietly, searching desperately for the right words to say..

After a long stretch of silence, he spoke, hoping fervently that he had chosen his words well.

"Well, then, shall we make for the tavern?" Whatever she had been expecting, it was not that. She turned to meet his eye for the first time, and he was warmed by the spark of curiosity that lit her bloodshot eyes.

"A tavern, you say?" she repeated tentatively.

"Many hundreds of years it has been since I had the honor of attending a Numenorean vigil,* my Lady," he said, then laughed when her eyes widened in shock. "Do I surprise you?" he teased. "Good. Then I still have a few mysteries left."

"And here I thought I had unraveled you completely," she replied, a slow smile dawning across her bloodless face.

"Not quite yet. My lady?" he prompted, offering his arm. The feeling of her small, warm hand slipping into the crook of his elbow was so achingly familiar that it almost brought tears to his eyes.

"Lead on, my lord."

* * *

The city of Mithlond nestled upon a stretch of silver-white beach, joyfully bustling and brimming with song. Complex garlands of woven, budding vines adorned every door and window-boxes overflowed with jewel-bright blooms, and the whole city of elegant, pale gray stone houses tilted towards the sea upon a great slope. The smooth white cobblestones, subtly luminous under the pale spring sun, felt warm and welcoming under Aearis's feet. Everything smelled of flowers and salt.

The tasteful elven inns were a far cry from the boisterous, uncouth warmth of Andunie's seaside taverns, and sometimes Aearis found herself rendered momentarily breathless with desperate homesickness. But as they drew nearer to the docks, the music changed, became rougher, rowdier, and far less refined. The elves of the Mithlond port worked in perfect, unchoreographed harmony, marshaled only by their simple, rhythmic songs. Aearis fixed her eyes on the broad, steady hands of the Lindon mariners and curled her toes against the weathered wood of the dock.

As they walked through Mithlond, Aearis quickly became aware of the quiet flutter that stirred the streets when Glorfindel came into view. Every pretty elvish face turned towards him like flowers to the sun, wide eyes, flushed cheeks, breathless whispers followed them as their motley little party passed.

"I begin to think," she remarked to Cestedir in a low voice, her tone perhaps more acid than she strictly intended, "that he ought to wheel a fainting couch around with him. It might alleviate some of the casualties that arise upon his passing through."

Cestedir chuckled under his breath and cast her a sympathetic look that she strongly resented.

"Worry not, my dear," he answered, his eyes sparkling with mischief. "His fame has never dissuaded him from hanging upon your every word, I doubt it shall now."

"You mistake me," she replied, infusing her voice with as much of Rhossorieth's lofty condescension as she could. "I concern myself only with the health of the young ladies of Lindon. Swooning repeatedly on hard cobblestone is strongly discouraged by all reputable medical authorities."

Cestedir guffawed merrily, and for a few seconds it brought color to his sunken cheeks.

As the sun sank into the western sea, painting the clouded sky in brilliant, blooming hues of red and gold, and thousands of shining lanterns of silver and gold blazed into life throughout the port city, Glorfindel led them to a tavern near the water's edge. It was built in the same lustrous stone as the rest of the city, with high arches and elaborately wrought metalwork suspending brilliant lanterns. But one wall had been plastered and painted bright blue, with lively-colored scrollwork covering the wall with simple yet carefully drawn imagery of swooping birds, sea serpents, and ships. The Singing Marigold Inn, it was declared by the beautifully-painted sign. A taste of Andustar so potent and unexpected that Aearis's knees nearly buckled, for all her muttered complaints of swooning maidens just hours ago.

"What is this place?" she whispered, resting a trembling hand against one of the cool stone pillars.

"Step inside," Glorfindel said softly. "Go on. It will not vanish, I swear to you."

He pulled open the heavy wooden door, and a wash of light, laughter, and singing washed over her with a sort of stinging sweetness. She took a deep breath, and stepped inside.

It was all she could have hoped it would be. The interior was a large circular room, lit with braziers filled with driftwood that burned in blues and violets. Large tables were filled with sailors, elven and Mannish, clearly straight from the docks, with salt in their hair and the pink tint of sun on their cheeks. At the center of the circle, on a raised wooden platform in the rough stone floor, three elvish mariners, equipped with a fiddle, a set of pipes, and a small lute, performed a light, merry song.

An enormous man with wild, wiry red hair and hands like shovels rushed to and fro, maneuvering through the throngs of pleasantly inebriated patrons with surprising agility for a man of his size. And a Man he was, unmistakably, with his ruddy cheeks and coarse skin. Yet he navigated the room as if he owned it, perfectly at ease in his rule in this elven realm.

"That is Remlas, son of Remdorn," murmured Glorfindel behind her. "He has been master of this inn since his father died. Seven generations of Numenorean sailors have kept this place, since their foremother first came to these shores from Andunie."

"And they live here freely in the kingdom of the Noldor?" Bereneth asked with a tone of wonder. "I knew not that any Men dwelt in the realms of Gil-Galad."

"He is not such a terribly severe fellow as Silvan tradition might have you believe," Glorfindel replied lightly. But though he chortled as he spoke, there was a trace of regret in his eyes.

"I shall take your word for it," Bereneth said, a deep furrow between her brows. "I have no desire to test that assertion in person."

"I fear that you may find yourself without much choice in the matter," he sighed, resting his large hand on her shoulder. "King Gil-Galad has doubtless heard of you by now, and there is little chance that he would neglect the acquaintance of any warrior with your mettle." Aearis saw the proud girl's shoulders tense and her mouth harden into a firm line, and guilt clenched in her own belly. She knew without a doubt that Bereneth would never have chosen to set foot in the realm of the Noldo King, save out of devotion to her.

"Worry not, my love," she said, entwining their fingers and squeezing tightly. "While I draw breath, no one, be they dragon, king, or commoner, shall be allowed to do you harm."

Bereneth rolled her eyes, but her mouth softened into the hint of a smile.

"Careful, Aearis. You make promises that you cannot keep."

She opened her mouth to argue, but she was forestalled by the red-haired Man, who skidded to a stop mere inches from flattening them. His face was ruddy from the exertion of ceaseless activity, and he huffed in a way that an elf never would. The sight of a mortal soul in this shining city of the firstborn was almost more than Aearis could endure without weeping.

"So you came back." He began speaking to Glorfindel without greeting or preamble, in a voice like war drums. "Looks like I lost that bet." Glorfindel stepped forward to clasp his hand in the manner of Numenor, somehow flawlessly blending the delicacy of the Eldar with the unpretentious warmth of Men.

"You thought me lost forever, Remlas? How quick you are to dismiss old friends," he replied with a brilliant smile that belied his reproach.

"Twenty years is a long time for a wedding, no matter how many thousands of years old you are. I figured you'd been eaten by a dragon. Or met a woman. Either way, I counted you among the fallen." Remlas spoke Sindarin with a perfect, careless drawl that left Aearis feeling rather self-conscious of her coarse Adunaic accent.* He turned his gaze upon Glorfindel's companions. His eyes were dark beyond color, and lustrous in a way that reminded her of intolerably nearby grief. "And what have you brought me now, milord? Not your usual company, I think."

"New friends, in need of a warm fire and strong ale," Glorfindel said, and his hand jumped-reflexively, it seemed-to the small of Aearis's back as the Man's discerning glance fell on her. She watched as he took in the freckles on her cheeks and shoulders, her diminutive stature compared to her tall, graceful companions, her wild curls and dark skin. Then Remlas smiled broadly, his strong, brilliantly white teeth flashing. Again, Aearis felt the reminder of Andunie like a knife slipped upward behind her ribs.

"Daughter of Numenor, you are welcome here," he boomed, and it took Aearis a moment to realize that he was speaking in Adunaic. "Yours is a story worth hearing, I'll wager."

She stepped forward and clasped his rough, calloused hand.

"My tale for yours, brother," she replied, the language coming to her tongue reluctantly, clumsily. "But today I come to tell the story of another, for one of my kin fell in battle, and I would honor her memory in the way of our people."

Though his bushy eyebrows shot up into his hair and curiosity glittered in his eyes, he asked no more questions. Aearis was grateful for it, for she had no heart to answer questions. Instead, he leapt into action. Barrels of wine were hauled up from the cellar, patrons were swiftly herded, chairs rearranged, platters of meat brought from the kitchens, and Aearis found herself unaccountably holding a fine, heavy fourteen-string lute in her arms and lifted unceremoniously onto the raised wooden dais. For a time, the inn was drowned with the clinking of tankards and the inquisitive murmurs of the patrons.

But slowly the din died to an expectant silence, leaving Aearis standing with Cestedir, Bereneth, and Glorfindel at the center of the circle, arms heavy with the daunting instrument and tongue suddenly leaden under the scrutiny of many eyes. Strangers. They knew nothing of the woman who had glittered like the night sky, ridden like a stormfront, fought as though the world's injustice was hers to redress. And now they would never know her, for she had died in the dirt with a hole where her heart, her tireless heart, had once beaten stronger than thunder.

Aearis's fingers slipped on the strings, and a discordant note rang out. She saw the winces on the delicate elven faces mingling with confusion and pity. Her hands had never felt so weak, and the name of the dead woman stuck in her throat. Unbidden, the image of a looming Shadow, a tear in the sky, advancing towards her, smothering her fëa with its poison voice, sprang into her mind's eye. She was choking, her vision swimming, cold fingers creeping under her skin and reaching for her heart.

A pair of warm hands resting lightly upon her shoulders yanked her back into the present. She looked up into a pair of pale green eyes, sunken and heavily underscored with dark circles, but bright with life still.

"Start slow," said Cestedir. "When you're ready."

She began tentatively, and her fingers explored the strings like lands unknown. The strings responded readily, plucking out a fragile, lonely, uncertain melody. It wandered aimlessly for a time before picking up strength, finding a wild, restless rhythm as it swelled. Her lute was joined by the woodwind shiver of a flute and and the warm, sharp cry of a fiddle. And finally by a voice-Glorfindel's voice, deep, resonant, and intimate, pouring into her like honey wine. The words came to her in a mix of Adunaic and Sindarin. The story of the lady of the shore, of the dancing girl, the starry shieldmaiden, the dark rider.

The world was a swirl of dizzying light and music, throbbing with the sort of desperate vitality that could only follow from the deepest tragedy. The music swelled simultaneously boisterous and profoundly sad. Sweet wine made from frozen grapes flowed freely, leading the Lindon mariners into a state of half-delirious revelry. They succumbed to her will, dictated by the rhythm that Aearis drummed out with her heel against the wood.

She played late into the night, until her arms were too heavy to bear the weight of the beautiful lute and her throat was raw. When she finally retired to a table beside a large window that faced the ocean, her companions joined her, instantly replaced on the podium by the elven minstrels. The room was thrumming with energy, still caught in the strange mood of hysterical celebration.

She glanced around, her gaze alighting first on Bereneth, whose eyes were fixed steadily on her own. Though she was smiling, there was worry etched in the slight furrow of her brow and at the corners of her eyes. Uncomfortable under the sincerity of those luminous gray eyes, Aearis elected to drink deeply from her glass of fiery whiskey.

"Aearis-"

"Come dance," she interrupted, before Bereneth could say anything hard to forget, rising to her feet. But she was stopped by slender fingers wrapped in an unbreakable grip around her wrist.

"Sit still for a moment, Aearis. For my sake." There was no resisting the gentle firmness in that voice. She sat.

From her pocket, Bereneth withdrew what appeared to be a handful of twinkling stars. Aearis stared at them blankly for a moment before her mind identified them, then, to her horror, she found her vision blurring and her eyes stinging with salt. She shook her head without speaking, afraid that the words would catch in her throat.

"Take them, Aearis. You were her daughter. You _are _her daughter." Reluctantly, Aearis received the little trove of silver light, warm and strangely heavy in her palm. Absently, almost involuntarily, she reached out to catch a strand of Bereneth's silky hair between her fingers. Heedless of Bereneth's soft protest, she began to braid with her mariner's hands, weaving the glittering beads into auburn hair in a hazy, pleasant trance. She worked with the slow, tentative uncertainty of one recalling a long-forgotten tune on the strings of an unfamiliar instrument, but gradually she found again the intricate, woven maze of lustrous braids.

"There," she murmured, taking her seat once more watching the blue light of the braziers dance over the little silver beads in Bereneth's hair. "Now they are where they should be."

"But-" Her wide gray eyes were bright with tears, and Aearis clasped her hands to stop them trembling.

"You are her daughter too, you know. I may carry her blood, but I think it is you who carries her spirit. And, sister, if you promise to tell me that I am a fool when I deserve it, I swear to drive away your unwanted suitors with fire and steel."

Bereneth choked out a sound somewhere between laughter and sobbing.

"To Gimlith of Andunie," she whispered, raising her goblet. Aearis looked upon her companion, lustrous and quietly marvelous, and she found that the sound of her mother's name did not drive quite so cruelly into her heart this time.

"To Gimlith," said Cestedir hoarsely, raising his tankard of ale. His voice was so weak that it nearly vanished under the current of music.

"To Gimlith." Glorfindel's voice rang strong and sweet, but his eyes were dim with sadness.

Aearis let her eyes rest on the face of each of her companions in turn, memorizing each of them with voracious attention. Her vision darkened for a moment. When she looked at Cestedir again, he seemed slightly transparent around the edges, with the flickering, spectral unsteadiness of a guttering candle flame. She shook herself and turned her eyes to Bereneth. But what was that, staining her cotton riding clothes, like a pool of rust spreading out from her heart? And Glorfindel… his eyes were like lanterns extinguished, and the way the shadows fell upon him suddenly resembled dark arrows marring his beautiful form.

A sharp, cold pain lanced through her chest and her hand flew to her heart. Then it was over. The room was warm once again, and her companions, unstained and alive, watched her expectantly. With a hand trembling only a little, she raised her glass.

"To Gimlith."

Though the music played on, Aearis found herself drawn away to the shore as the night wore on. She slipped out when she saw Bereneth and Cestedir engaged in conversation with Remlas. Glorfindel was nowhere to be seen, and Aearis could only guess that he had found a pretty mariner to share his bed for the night.

The sky was moonless and dark with clouds when she found her way to the sea. She walked westwards until the lights of the city vanished behind her and only the song of crashing waves remained. The night air had an electric quality, the scent of a coming storm, and from the North a cold, piercing wind began to tear at her skin.

The brine rushed in to meet her with ardent urgency. It pulled her in greedily, drawing her out until she stood up to her waist in the water, riding the seductive ebb and flow of the crashing waves, letting the sea explore her curiously, reviving her shredded fëa with every tender incursion.

She could keep going. Strike out straight ahead and lose herself in the current until nothing except her fëa remained, nothing but a spray of sea foam. The ocean stretched out invitingly before her, black and fathomless under the clouded night sky. The song of distant trumpets seemed to echo far away to the West. And after all, why not? The world behind her had gone silent. It was ugly and harsh, and it took, and took, and took. Why carry the weight of such a vicious, ungrateful world, when the saltwater could bear her aloft, weightless and forgetting?

She wanted to take another step, then another. She wanted to dive down deep and let the silence of the sea take her into its cold embrace.

"Aearis." Glorfindel's musical voice behind her shattered the crystalline state of tranquility that had taken over her. Reluctantly, irritated by her own weakness, she turned to look over her shoulder. Under the starless, moonless sky, the land was perfectly, uniformly dark, lit only by his glowing figure. Golden light rippled over the dark water, dancing out upon the waves to reach her. He stood knee-deep in the sea, his great, gentle hands hanging limp by his sides, absolutely still save for the stirring of a breeze in his glorious hair.

And if the sight of him did not soothe the torment, at least it distracted her from the cleansing sting of the saltwater washing over her raw, tattered fëa. She held her arms out to him and he came instantly, wading to her until they stood together in the endless expanse of dark saltwater. His light encompassed her, falling over her skin like a caress. The closeness of him set her pulse racing, ignited a loud, gnawing hunger to touch and be touched. There were reasons not to want this, not with him. So many reasons. Good reasons. But for the life of her, she could not remember a single one.

Before her memory could return inconveniently, she seized the front of his shirt and pulled him down, heard the sharp intake of breath seconds before her lips were on his. It was a searing jolt of heat, starting deep in her abdomen and propagating out to set her whole body vibrating. Slowly, she released him, and he stared at her with wide, blackened eyes, breathing hard.

She watched him raptly, suddenly feeling unbearably vulnerable as the silence stretched. Then his arms were around her, gathering her up into a crushing, feverish kiss.

She pressed into him, lost her fingers in his golden mane, tangled herself deeper and deeper in his embrace. He captured her senses completely. All she knew was the sweetness of his mouth, the pressure of his hands against her waist, the firm, powerful body of a warrior that shuddered and trembled under her touch. For the first time in what felt like an eternity, she felt warm.

But then he was pulling away, caging her lips with the fingers of one hand as she made to follow. Every ravenous fiber of her body and spirit shuddered at the sudden withdrawal, but he disentangled from her with gentle perseverance. She shivered violently as the cold came rushing back in, freezing the blood in her veins.

"Azruari, I must be heard." He spoke urgently, one hand wrapped around both her wrists to keep her still. "Please, just listen to me for a moment." At the sound of her true name, she found herself acquiescing, though she could not bring herself to meet his eyes. When she stood perfectly still, he continued. "It would be wrong now to keep it from you, though I wish with all my heart that I had been free to tell you before. Gimlith was ill. Terribly ill. She-" He broke off at the sight of her expression.

"You _knew_?" she hissed, and she saw his face buckle under her hard glare. He opened and closed his mouth several times before speaking again.

"Yes," he said, finally. "And I saw that she would not live to meet the sea again. I begged her to reconsider the journey. She would not hear of it-"

"You _knew_, and you did _nothing_-"

"She would not be restrained." Under the full force of her ire, he remained calm, rational, and it infuriated her beyond speech.

"You could have told me-"

He hesitated, his serene mask slipping for a moment.

"She would not have it known. Azruari-"

"You will _not _call me by that name." She pulled her wrists from his slackened fingers and his hand fell to his side. He was looking at her with an intolerable expression of sadness and sympathy.

"As you wish," he said.

"Leave." Her own voice sounded toneless and cold in her ears. "Please."

For a moment he looked like he might argue. But something in her stare seemed to kill the words in his throat. She watched him vanish, and let silence reign.

A biting wind began to stir the waves into fury and heavy rain followed closely after, but Aearis remained by the shore even as blue bolts began to fork over the sea and thunder rolled over her. The song of the storm ran through her blood, violent, electric, and exhilarating, and she joined her voice with it. The sea's power coursed from her feet to the tips of her hair, filling her until there was no room for anger, grief, or even regret. Her skin tingled under the freezing onslaught of the downpour, and she let the wind encircle her before bringing it under the power of her voice.

It shuddered under her yoke, bucking and snarling against her will. But her spirit was hungry and drunk with anger, and the more the wind struggled the more entangled it became, until finally it surrendered to her will. She wreathed herself in cyclonic winds and let the hurricane grow, carrying her out over the water. Her circling winds sang out with her voice to the lightning, and it answered her call, danced to her song with perfect obedience. It was intoxicatingly, irresistibly satisfying, to bend the storm into a crown, to hear the thunder drum out her heartbeat over this foreign shore, to impose control where once there was chaos.

She drove the storm to exhaustion, let it fill her aching, empty breast with its tumultuous song, until the skies were emptied and the stars shone once again above the shore. The tide deposited her gently upon the sand, swirling in tentative eddies around her feet.

"Now _that_," said a clear, ringing voice, a clarion voice of singing steel and rumbling quakes, "was fun."

She was tired. Too tired to stand and face the stranger. But she raised her eyes to look at him as he stood towering above her, crowned by the glittering firmament. His eyes burned like stars framed between lashes so thick and dark that they seemed rimmed with kohl. His face, all angles and edges, was lit by a wild, fierce smile. Everything, even his mirth, was razor-sharp and savagely beautiful.

Aearis, still pleasantly drunk from her dalliance with the storm, extended her hand up to him and he bent low to kiss it with ironic, but impeccable, chivalry.

"Yes," she mused, "yes, it was, rather." He lowered himself gracefully to sit beside her in the sand. The lustrous blackness of his hair reminded her of Elrond, but in the luminous, merciless perfection of his features he seemed more alike to Galadriel or Glorfindel.

"You have an appetite for control," he observed, fixing her with a bright, penetrating gaze. "And, more importantly, a talent for it." She started and stared at him. This was not the first time such a thing had been said of her, but it chilled her now more than ever, for she felt the truth of it.

"I suppose," she conceded, with the sudden sensation of teetering on the edge of a blade. "Control is some consolation when worthier prey eludes me." He raised a quizzical brow, and his eyes burned brighter still.

"And what do you hunt, storm-charmer?" He leaned forward, and she felt the impact of those glittering eyes like a tangible force, dazzling and disorienting.

"Answers." The reply sprang to her lips without consideration. A slow, sharp smile spread over the stranger's face.

"You are a diverting riddle indeed my lady."

"I strive to entertain," she said, and she could not keep the note of bitterness out of her voice.

"A noble vocation," he replied. "Perhaps the noblest of all, these days." His face was unreadable, but his words made Aearis oddly sad.

"And you? Have you a vocation?" she asked, unable to break from his gaze.

"A vocation…" he repeated dreamily, testing the word on his tongue. "I could not say. An _occupation_, certainly."

The conversation lulled, and Aearis realized that every muscle in her body was extraordinarily tense. To distract herself, she hummed to herself, a tune whose origin she no longer remembered, but which spoke to her of somewhere that might be _home._

The stranger shuddered suddenly and fixed her again with those star-bright eyes.

"Do you know any songs about dragons?" he asked suddenly, impetuous as a child. His eyes glinted hungrily and she hardly suppressed a shiver.

"A few rather morose ones," she replied holding his gaze with great difficulty. "From the First Age. But I have little taste for sad songs at the moment." For a moment his eyes hardened, but then he smiled again, slowly, revealing all his glinting white teeth.

"Indeed, such a night as this should not be sullied by grief," he agreed, with a gracious nod.

"I do know a fanciful old tale of a sailor and a sea serpent," she offered. "If you would accompany me..." He stared for a moment at the little silver flute that she offered him before uttering a single, jagged bark of laughter and picking it up delicately in his long, powerful fingers.

She began to sing, and the star-eyed stranger watched her unblinkingly, Runhilde's flute poised against his lips. The melody that formed between them was tense and turbulent, with a rhythm that rushed and accelerated into a mad, frenzied crescendo. The wind stirred uneasily around them again. Then they dropped suddenly into silence, leaving Aearis covered in cold sweat and struggling to breathe. The stinging power of the brine coursed through her bloodstream and the music of the shore rang in her ears. And through it all, that bright, mesmeric gaze. A constant, unwavering call to glory.

"Well?" she prompted, though she could scarcely hear her own voice as it wove itself seamlessly with the rush of the waves and the harmonies of the wind. "Are you entertained?"

He smiled his fierce, avid smile and rose fluidly to his feet.

"More than I had any right to expect," he replied. "Thank the Valar for stormy nights and interesting strangers."

He bowed over her hand once again before sauntering away, eastwards along the shore, whistling as he went.

"Will I see you again?" she called out, wincing at her own trite words. But curiosity had flickered to life, drawing her towards the steel-bright stranger like an unfortunate moth.

"I suppose you shall have to," he replied with a rakish grin of wild, breathtaking beauty thrown over his shoulder. "I have your flute."

And then he was gone, swallowed by the all-consuming night.

Left perfectly alone upon the sand once again, Aearis lost herself in the deafening song of the strange shore. Time passed unmarked, and that darkest of nights stretched infinitely out in every direction, and she felt it press against her skin like an embrace. The wind and sea and stars rushed in through her skin, filling her with unfamiliar, exhilarating stories. She let the music of Lindon permeate her, drive her thoughts outward until all her aches and pains receded into obscurity. Power flooded through every fiber of this overwhelming, starlit realm, and it sent her head spinning with its intoxicating potency.

But slowly, lazily, the first rays of dawn crept up behind her, and with them returned the yawning ache. She shivered under the blushing sky, but her eyes stayed fixed on the western sea.

"Are you ready?" The voice beside her was so quiet that for a moment she thought she had imagined it, until she realized that there were long, slender fingers interlaced with her own. Bereneth's hands were always so warm, even on the chilliest days.

To her own surprise, Aearis smiled.

"There are quite a lot of layers to that question," she said. Stalling. "But I think," she sighed, "the answer is generally 'no.'"

Another hand, rough with scars and calluses, grasped her left.

"We'll start slow," said Cestedir.

Aearis raised a brow at him. He looked exhausted, hollow-eyed. But beneath his skin he still shone with the light of a hearth fire. She laughed despite herself when Dinalagos pressed his hot, wet nose against her ear and grumbled loudly, announcing his expectation of a swift and extensive breakfast. She breathed in deeply and nodded, and if her hands shook, they were steadied by the firm, warm grips on each side of her. Then she turned to meet the breaking day.

* * *

**Notes:**

*The Adunaic language apparently had a lot in common with the languages of the Men of the East, with some Sindarin influence mixed in. So I'm imagining the accent to roughly resemble an Israeli accent, whereas a Sindarin/elvish accent might sound more Welsh.

*This may not be at all canon-compliant (I've found relatively little information about Numenorean culture). However, given that Numenoreans were initially pretty cool about death, and also given that they're sailors, I imagine traditional (that is to say, pre-corruption) Numenorean death rituals as boozy and celebratory like an Irish wake-especially when the deceased died valiantly in battle or comfortably after a long life. Of course, Aearis handles death less gracefully, but Gimlith, I think, would want them to paint the town good and properly red.


	16. The House of Glass

"Where can we hide in fair weather, we orphans of the storm?"

― Evelyn Waugh, _Brideshead Revisited_

Bereneth and Cestedir found their way back to the Singing Marigold, Aearis in tow, in the first hour of morning light. The silk of her dress had been ruined with salt water, and her hair was a hurricane of dark, windswept tangles. But there was color in her cheeks again, and her eyes blazed like an electric storm.

She greeted him with a cool incline of her head, casting her eyes downward to avoid holding his gaze. Cestedir shot a curious glance between them, but he asked no questions, and the tension was allowed to sit undisturbed and smothering over their party like a funeral shroud.

"We should make for my manor in Harlindon," Glorfindel said at breakfast, once everyone had filled their plates. "I expect that Rhossorieth will summon us to court in a fortnight at most, and there is much to be done before you can make such an appearance."

"Two weeks to mourn a loved one." Bereneth's tone was carefully neutral, but he saw a flash of ire in her usually serene eyes. "Is this the generosity we can expect of the court of the High King?"

"I will stall them as long as I can," he promised, placating, "but-"

"Unnecessary." Glorfindel's head snapped around at Aearis's sudden interjection. She had spoken so little all morning that the sound of her voice sent a shiver down his spine. "We are already within three miles of the palace-we may as well join the court now."

What color remained in Bereneth's fair face promptly left it. He hastened to speak again to soothe the Silvan girl's rising anxiety.

"Impossible," he replied. Aearis's eyes narrowed at the decisive note in his voice, and he felt her contrary spirit buck against his will. "None of you are ready for the Lindon court."

"Oh?" Her voice was steeped in restless, simmering resentment. "And in what way do you deem us lacking, My Lord?" Despite himself, he felt a spark of irritation begin smoldering behind his sternum. But before he could make a hasty retort, Cestedir forestalled him.

"Aearis, would you make some effort to consult your reason just this once? We know nothing of the customs here. Two weeks is little enough time to catch up as it is without your damned impatience."

Aearis opened her mouth, met Cestedir's eye, and closed it. Glorfindel could only marvel at the unprecedented concession. He waited for several seconds, but she appeared pacified.

"As I said, if we retire to my lands for a time, I can make preparations."

"Such as?" Aearis asked, a study in innocence under Cestedir's warning glare.

"For a start, you will all need clothes made."

"We have perfectly good clothes." Not so very pacified, then.

"Not by Lindon standards," he replied evenly, meeting her hard gaze. "Even your finest dress from Imladris would be taken as an insult if you wore it to court."

"There must be a seamstress in Mithlond," she said, apparently doggedly determined to disagree with him. "We can stay here at the Marigold. I can earn our keep."

"How? By working as a tavern minstrel?" Cestedir supplied. He spoke as though in jest, but there was no mirth in his face. "Or perhaps a post at the docks might suit you?"

"I will not be kept as a _pet_, Cestedir," she hissed, her cover of lofty calm cracking suddenly. "You may be content to walk in the shadows of lords, but I am not. Better a dock hand than a courtesan."

She might as well have sucked the air out of Glorfindel's lungs. The ember of frustration was extinguished utterly, leaving only cavernous, hollow sensation in his chest.

"_Enough._ Hush, Aearis, you are talking nonsense." Bereneth spoke with an air of perfect finality. "We are guests in this land. We will do as our wiser friends suggest and accept their help with gratitude."

Aearis looked ready to argue, but Bereneth pointed silently to the beads in her hair. A wry smile twisted Aearis's mouth and her face softened instantly.

"As you say," she said, with a nod so courtly that it may as well have been a bow. "Courtesan it is."

* * *

The ferry ride to Harlond was bright with music, for the elves who passed between the harbors of Lindon seemed to have an endless supply of songs that were known to all among them. For once, Aearis listened in silence. These were not the cheerful, open elves of Imladris, whose warm, easy manners welcomed strangers into ready intimacy. Nor were they cold and suspicious like the elves of Lothlorien, concealing their distrust of outsiders beneath a thin veneer of civility. The Noldor of Lindon were elegant, cosmopolitan, as marvellously charming as they were utterly unreadable. Their conversations slid fluidly between Sindarin and Quenya, leaping quickly between matters of state, lore, art, and fashion.

Aearis felt extraordinarily small amongst these tall, unrelentingly clever strangers, like a pebble amongst precious gems. Her small trunk of possessions had been sent ahead with the horses, and she cursed her impulsive decision to ruin her only available dress with sea water, for now she stood barefoot among her impeccably dressed fellow passengers with her wrinkled, discolored dress and hair curling with wild abandon in the ocean air, not to mention Dinalagos curled into a disgruntled ball at her feet. But even as she tugged self-consciously at the sleeves of her ruined dress and ran her fingers uselessly through her hair, she felt the power of the ocean thrumming all around her with intensity that left her light-headed.

Between Aearis and Glorfindel there stretched a tenuous detente, marked by perfect, hollow politeness. Every time she looked at him, she remembered his rushed confession, that he had predicted that her mother would never survive to meet the sea again, and anger surged through her blood with overpowering force. He had _assured _her. She had left her mother's life in his hands, and still she had died with the Shadow's sword in her heart.

"How long do you intend to keep this up?" Bereneth asked her as they stood together at the rail of the ferry, looking out on the brilliantly blue water. "He is beside himself."

"You think me unreasonable. More so than usual, I mean." Bereneth met her eye with a wry smile. She had listened with patient neutrality as Aearis explained in hushed tones-with one notable omission-what had transpired between them at the shore. But Bereneth's tranquil reception of the revelation that sat so bitter on Aearis's tongue served only to infuriate her more.

"You are grieving-of _course _you are unreasonable. It would be more worrisome if you weren't. I only wish that you would aim your ire at any other target," she sighed, turning to look at the golden-haired elf with an expression of deep concern that galled Aearis to no end.

"He _knew-_" she started, the words hissing out between her teeth with more vehemence than she had intended.

"So did we. So did Cestedir. What should he have done? Thrown her into the dungeons of Imladris to stop her making the journey? Forbidden her from riding out to protect her husband?" Bereneth's voice was maddeningly calm. When Aearis said nothing, only tightening her grip on the railing until her knuckles were starkly white, she continued speaking. "I understand your anger, darling. We all do. But just because Glorfindel will suffer it without complaint does not mean that he deserves to bear the brunt. How long do you intend to punish him for someone else's crime?"

Aearis swallowed hard against the lump in her throat, but the next words came out choked nonetheless.

"She would not be dead if he-"

"The decisions that lead to her death were hers, and hers alone," Bereneth interrupted, and there was an edge to her voice that Aearis had seldom heard before. "Your anger is not with him, and you would be a fool to torture the living with your grudges against the dead."

She strode away before Aearis could find any reply, leaving her steeping in an unpleasant concoction of fury, indignation, and shame.

But Glorfindel looked far from tortured to Aearis's ungenerous eye. From the moment they had set foot in Mithlond, he was constantly surrounded by a glittering crowd of beautiful elves, who orbited him with sickening adulation. In Imladris, he had been loved and admired. In Lindon, it seemed, he was positively revered. He received these slavish attentions with serene good humor. He seemed to know everyone, remember the names of their children, their parents, and their favorite hound.

They were greeted at the harbor of Harlond by what might be fairly called a giantess by the standards of any reasonably-sized person. She was clad in the light, practical cotton clothes in shades of pale blue, embroidered with flowering vines in golden thread. Her dark hair was tied back in a maze of tight, perfectly interwoven ropes. Though she was clearly elvish, she carried herself with practical, unromantic posture. There was a harsh, hawkish beauty about her weathered face, but she had none of the delicacy that elves so treasured, for her shoulders were as broad as a Man's, and her long arms and legs were thickly corded with muscle. Glorfindel greeted her with an elated cry, jumping over the railing of the ferry onto the dock to embrace her.

"My my," she said as the others approached the enormous pair cautiously, "if you missed me so much, perhaps you should have returned sooner. And what have you brought me, my lord? A fine assortment of strays, indeed-you always do bring the best presents."

"Thalwest, allow me to introduce my traveling companions. Captain Cestedir of the Imladris Guard, Lady Bereneth Amathiel, and-"

"Aearis," she interrupted, stepping forward swiftly to introduce herself. "Of Andunie." She bowed with a hand over her heart and Thalwest returned the gesture, throwing an inquisitive look at Glorfindel as she did.

"Well met, friends," she said in her deep, resonating voice. "I am Thalwest, Steward of Lord Glorfindel's lands. You are most welcome here."

"They are to stay at the manor, Thalwest. Would you-"

"I have contracted a tailor, a seamstress, a dance instructor, and a lady's maid in town. Will that suffice, my lord?" Glorfindel grinned broadly.

"I see my presence is entirely unnecessary as ever." Thalwest returned his smile, but without conviction.

"No indeed, my lord, you are most needed here." She spoke seriously, the words laden with unspoken meaning. Glorfindel's brow furrowed deeply, but he said nothing.

* * *

The House of the Golden Flower was without rival the most beautiful work of architecture that Bereneth had ever seen. It was built out of a cliff overlooking the western sea, composed of slender, towering vaulted arches of rough stone and great windows of many-faceted glass that split the light into a cascade of jewel-bright hues like sunlit waterfalls. The floor of the airy entrance hall was a single, vast mosaic in the image of a starry sky, inlaid with lapis lazuli and pearlescent shell.

But, even lovelier than any of the artistic excesses of the Noldor was the woman who awaited them there in the center of that wondrous room. Lady Rhossorieth was seated with her usual air of imperious repose, commanding the room with the sheer overwhelming force of her beauty. Her circlet of mithril and blazing sapphires haloed her in uncanny blue light, and her gown of iridescent, diaphanous silver silk glowed under the afternoon sun. She rose to meet them with that lovely, heartless smile of hers and slender arms outstretched in greeting.

Glorfindel came to a dead halt in front of them at the sight of her, and the casual, languid grace of his posture hardened instantly into almost battle-ready tension. She saw him throw an accusing glance at Thalwest, who shrugged, apparently just as surprised as the rest of them. Plainly Rhossorieth had timed her arrival perfectly, slipping in after Thalwest had departed to Harlond to retrieve them. An elegant ambush.

There was a moment-brief, but so unbearably tense that it stretched into an eternity-of perfect silence. Then, of course, Aearis spoke.

"Lady Rhossorieth, how delightfully unexpected to see you here!" She stepped forward and curtseyed deeply, utterly unselfconscious with her salt-soaked dress, her tangled curls, her bare feet. The quirk of a true smile flashed around Rhossorieth's mouth as her eyes flickered over the girl in quick appraisal.

"How extraordinarily well you look, Lady Aearis. The sea agrees with you."

Glorfindel cut in before Aearis could reply, and though his attitude was still that of a cornered animal, his voice was light and musical.

"To what do we owe this pleasure, my Lady? I did not think to have the privilege of your company for some time." He drew himself even taller, as if to form a wall between Rhossorieth and his companions.

"Peace, Glorfindel," she said with a crystalline laugh, her hand raised in placation. "I come to pay my condolences, nothing more. Lady Gimlith was…" she trailed off, and her eyes fell on Aearis again, on her proud, fragile posture. "She was extraordinary. Her loss will be felt by all who knew her." Her voice seemed so compellingly sincere that Bereneth allowed herself to admire her craft. Aearis, at least, seemed mollified, accepting the pleasantries with murmured thanks and downturned eyes. "I owe a great deal to your family," she continued, inclining her head to Aearis, Cestedir, and Bereneth in turn. "It is my dear hope that I might be allowed to be of service to you now." There was a pleasing uncertainty in Rhossorieth's eyes as she spoke. So pleasing that Bereneth was forced to stop and remind herself that every fleeting gesture of this exquisite Noldorin lady was the result of beautifully-engineered artifice.

Bereneth glanced as Cestedir as he shifted uncomfortably beside her, and he returned the look with barely concealed skepticism.

"A gracious offer," Glorfindel replied, gritting the words out through clenched teeth. "But I assure you, they will be well cared for here, my Lady."

"Of that, I have no doubt." Rhossorieth's composure in the shadow of Glorfindel's towering form was impeccable. "But you have long been absent from court. Perhaps your young charges might benefit from the guidance of a more… current view of matters of high society." Glorfindel bristled like Dinalagos over a bone.

"I have never had any difficulty navigating petty intrigue, Rhossorieth," he snapped. His thin veneer of courtly manners melted away. "I can teach them just as well as you can, with none of your ulterior motives."

The tension in the air shattered into jagged shards as Rhossorieth tilted her head back and burst into laughter. Not the musical, silvery laugh Bereneth had often heard from her, but piercing, shoulder-shaking expression of what could only be real amusement. Mockery rang in every syllable, and Glorfindel's powerful hands clenched into tight, white-knuckled fists.

"So much falsehood in so few words, Glorfindel. Truly you are a jewel of this court."

"And what lie would you accuse me of?" he snarled, a guttural sound that seemed to issue from the core of the earth itself.

"Oh, not lies, my dear. Never lies. Just a spectacular disregard for reality, as always. But, out of the six or seven points that immediately present themselves I shall select just one… Quite simply, you are not a woman."

"That, I will concede. What of it?"

"That you even need ask such a question proves my point, I think. The demands of this society on young ladies far exceed anything you have ever experienced, anywhere. You, Herald of Manwe, beloved and applauded for your very _existence_. You believe that you could ever comprehend the burden that will fall upon their shoulders the moment they set foot within the palace gates? You presume to know what a half-elven daughter of murky parentage and a Silvan orphan will face at court?" Though the words would have made Bereneth balk in any other context, there was no insult in Rhossorieth's tone. At least, not towards her. "They cannot rely on their unpolished charms here as they did in Imladris, nor can they spurn and reject the counsel of the leaders of this realm as in Lothlorien." Aearis shifted guiltily at this, twisting her hands together. "They must be above reproach. They must make the right friends, choose the perfect words, and astound the court with their beauty and skill. All this, and even so it may not be enough."

"You would manipulate them with fear-mongering. I will not allow it, Rhossorieth. You have seen Aearis's power, Bereneth's strength, and you would twist them to your own purpose."

"Ah, yes, my _ulterior motives,_" she retorted, the delicate inflection of her voice loaded with derision. "Whereas, in your perfectly disinterested opinion, the only acceptable course of action is to keep Aearis beneath your roof you until she-"

She broke off, taking an involuntary step back. Glorfindel's expression must have been terrible to behold, because a look of true fear flickered over Rhossorieth's face before she settled back into an impassive mask.

"If at any point either of you wish to consult _"them"_ on the matter of their own fate, Bereneth and I will be wherever the dining room is." Bereneth's pulse, which had spiked to goblin-hunting levels as the conflict mounted between the two fierce Noldor, climbed to an intolerable pitch as Aearis, slight, reckless, inexplicably confident Aearis, stepped between them. "Please do be sure to shout at each other quite loudly. I, for one, would very much like to hear what the pair of you decide on our behalf." She turned to Thalwest, who had been standing to the side-but still within arm's reach of her lord-with unobtrusively coiled muscles, and quirked a brow. The tall steward cast a wary look at Glorfindel before smiling and bowing to Aearis.

"Just this way, my friends. I took the liberty of having a warm meal prepared. The mushrooms from the Blue Mountains are delectable this time of year."

"You are perfectly marvelous, Thalwest," Aearis enthused, apparently perfectly indifferent to the burning glares that Rhossorieth and Glorfindel were exchanging over her head. She bestowed a deep curtsey and blithe smile upon each of them before following Thalwest to the great double doors at the other end of the hall. Bereneth followed her automatically, her frayed nerves vibrating. With one foot through the door, however, Aearis turned and fixed Glorfindel with a calm, fathomless gaze.

"She has a point, you know." Her quietly-spoken words slipped under his defenses, and his shoulders slumped in sudden defeat.

"Yes," he said. "I know."

* * *

She was a tyrant. Upon reflection, Aearis had to concede that she likely should have predicted as much. And, on her eighth consecutive hour of dancing lessons under Rhossorieth's exacting eye, she cursed her lack of foresight.

Rhossorieth circled as she practiced the steps again, a crystal chalice filled with wine teetering on the top of her head. Already the floor glittered with vicious slivers of the goblet's ill-fated predecessors. The fine, heavy silk gown of pure white that her fair dictator had insisted she wear was now amply adorned with deep red stains, marking each of her errors in stark relief. It had been precisely four thousand and forty-one beats since the last one had broken-her longest interval of success yet.

Out of the corner of her eye, Aearis could just spy Bereneth, turning with perfect ease through each of the devilishly complex motions of the dance, her first chalice still infuriatingly intact. The sound of a single fiddle, wielded by an increasingly uneasy, skittish-looking Silvan fellow, grated on her nerves as it repeated the same sickeningly sweet song ad nauseum.

"Aearis," Rhossorieth's voice flicked out like a whip. "Keep your hips in line with your shoulders." She could not contain a huff as she strove to correct her loose posture. The jagged crystal floor tinkled as every motion of her vast, preposterous skirt stirred them. "Such a sour expression does not become a lady of the court. Do you object to the Lillameril? Or is it my teaching that does not please you?" Though her tone suggested more amusement than offence, still Aearis dared no answer.

She was spared the necessity when Thalwest entered, followed by two footmen in elegant, pale blue livery carrying trays laden with fragrant cuts of meat. The sun had sunk low in the sky, casting a dancing golden hue over the broken crystal and deep red pools of wine, and Aearis's stomach snarled with primal ferocity at the enticing scents wafting towards her. Thalwest cast an appraising eye over the mayhem, and Aearis got the impression that here was one who had seen far worse. She cleared her throat and met Rhossorieth's eye with all the confidence of a loyal soldier acting on her orders.

"Lord Glorfindel bids me announce that it is supper time, my lady, and that no guest of his will be permitted to skip two meals in a row."

Unbidden and unwanted, Aearis felt a surge of affection for Glorfindel rush in before she hastily stamped it down. He had been forbidden in no uncertain terms from entering their improvised hall of torture after one too many attempts to argue with Rhossorieth's methods. Now, however, his fierce, overprotective presence would have come as a great relief.

"Pray tell Lord Glorfindel that his jurisdiction ends at the door, and that no pupil of _mine _shall be seated to a meal until she has learned the Lillameril. Bereneth, you may eat now if you choose."

"Thank you, my lady," Bereneth murmured without breaking the rhythm of her dance, "but I shall not eat until Aearis does."

Rhossorieth's slender brows shot up briefly before her expression returned almost instantly to its state of unruffled calm.

"As you will, then. Aearis, again."

Thalwest seemed to be of a mind to intervene more forcefully, but Aearis caught her eye and shook her head minutely-though the chalice wobbled dangerously nevertheless, causing a stream of wine to trickle into her right eye. She blinked furiously to clear the stinging red from her vision.

"Not to worry, Thalwest," she chirped, forcing a lighthearted smile, "I have quite nearly mastered the dance. The pantries will not be safe for long." By way of reply, Thalwest merely aimed an eloquent look at the disastrous state of the floor. "Just a flesh wound," she said, waving a dismissive hand and wincing as a second, larger torrent of wine slopped over the side of the chalice and down her back.

"He will not stop fussing until both of you have eaten," Thalwest pointed out, looking deeply aggrieved.

"Tell him that we will join him in the dining hall presently. And that we are not in the least bit-" she was interrupted by a gurgling roar from her empty stomach. "... hungry."

She held Thalwest's bright gaze with all the obstinacy that she could muster in her half-starved state. Finally, the giantess rolled her eyes and shrugged.

"Have it your way," she said, gesturing to the footmen, who surveyed the bloody scene in shock. The steward made to leave, muttering something about shared psychosis.

"Oh, and Thalwest? Leave the knives."

She waited until Thalwest's booted footsteps had retreated from the door before seizing a carving knife in one hand. Rhossorieth eyed her warily, her eyes flickering between Aearis's eyes and the glinting blade in her hand.

"Should I be concerned?" she asked, and Aearis was pleased with the slightest hint of hesitation that made its way into her eminently assured countenance. In response, she smiled and plucked the teetering goblet from her head, draining it in a single gulp. Then, the strong, sweet wine heady on her tongue, she dashed the hated object, delicate, beautiful, glittering, upon the floor. Rhossorieth watched silently, her tranquil expression frozen stiff on her perfect face.

"I cannot thank you enough, Lady Rhossorieth, for your patient tutelage. But no dance worth learning can be done in attire like this." So saying, she took the long, wicked carving knife and slashed at the thick, many-layered skirts of her ruined dress until only one remained, fluttering down to her knees in serrated tatters. Next she tended to her sleeves, amputating the long, gracefully sweeping trains that constantly flapped around her hands. The Silvan minstrel blanched and averted his eyes with a sort of choking hiccup. Finally she allowed the knife, which seemed to hold Rhossorieth in a trance as it enacted her heretical will, to clatter to the ground. She proffered her hand to the dark-haired lady with a dramatic bow. "_Now _we can dance."

* * *

When Glorfindel burst into the room, wondrous hair loose and chaotic around his face and ancient eyes wild with anger, he was instantly brought up short by the scene that greeted him.

At the center of the room, Rhossorieth and Aearis circled each other to the quavering tune of the fiddle. Rhossorieth's hand rested against Aearis's rib cage just under her heart, and the two women moved in tenuous synchrony, their every step in perfect agreement with each impetuous phrase of the music. Their steps intertwined in endlessly complex patterns, perilously close entanglement without accident or discord, as though they were responding to commands heard by none but them.

There was a breathless harmony between them-an ardent, urgent understanding that drove the delicate dance, faster and faster, swirling with muted power. Under the dying light, Aearis blossomed, crimson as the sunset. Red stains trickled over her skin and crept around the bodice of her luminous white dress like bloody vines, dyed her lips dark and succulent and intoxicating with the kiss of wine. There was a flush in her cheeks and dark curls traced tenderly over her temples and throat, escaping from their intricately constricting braids and alive with the rhythm of her motion. She pushed and pulled playfully, like the tide, and Rhossorieth, proud Rhossorieth, the Lady of Whispers, fell to her will like a breeze to a cyclone.

When the music drew to a close, the minstrel fell against the wall in a slump, as though the bones had left his body, and the room awakened slowly. Lanterns began flickering to life as darkness gathered under the tall glass windows, and a shimmering haze of light fell over the assembled elves.

Aearis was the first to speak, breaking the reverent silence as casually as a crystal chalice.

"And _that, _my lady, is how we dance in Numenor."

Rhossorieth did not speak for a long, taut moment, her unreadable eyes locked with Aearis's. When she did, she sounded pensive, almost dreamy.

"You have given me a great deal to think about, Aearis of Andunie." She raised her right hand and scrutinized it, as though she expected to see burn marks when it had touched the young woman. "I should return to my post," she went on after another pause. "I will call again soon."

She departed in a rustle of silk and a clinking of glass, followed by the melancholy Silvan player.

"So," Aearis began, shattering the quiet once more. "Dinner?"

* * *

True to her word and unfailingly punctual, Rhossorieth returned to the manor not a week after the puzzling dance lesson.

This time, however, she came prepared. Her attendants, countless and each more beautiful and finely dress than the last, fluttered in behind her like a flock of jeweled birds. Their arms were laden with lustrous fabrics and glittering gems on finely wrought chains.

"I have reflected, Lady Aearis, and I see now that I was mistaken in my approach. A lady of the Noldor you shall never be, nor should you."

"And whom would you have me be, Lady Rhossorieth?" Aearis eyed her curiously. The pale lady was perfectly unchanged, yet there was a new note in the air between them. If she had not known better, Aearis might almost have supposed it to be _respect._

"Why, yourself, Lady Aearis. Who else?"

As it turned out, Rhossorieth's idea of "_being herself" _involved far more alterations and adjustments than a naive observer might expect. Her table manners, Aearis learned, were utterly unsuited to her new role, and her head was soon spinning with the intricate choreography of Lindon dining. Over the course of three weeks, every detail of her conduct was minutely pried apart and reforged, almost identical but with the unmistakable sheen of a master's craftsmanship. Her steps were lighter, her laughter sweeter, her eyes brighter, and her blushes prettier. It must all be _natural_. Unaffected. Effortless. And, of course, it must all be _perfect._

The girls' Imladris wardrobe, too, had been deemed unacceptable, and Rhossorieth had arrived fully prepared to remedy the shortcomings of her new charges.

Bereneth she clad in the current fashions of the Noldor: structured, heavily embroidered gowns with bodices that dipped to expose the ridge of her collarbone and outlined the curve of her narrow waist to great effect. The sleeves were banded at the elbow, then flared to drape long and rustling against the folds of her voluminous skirts. She pulled at the offending fabric absent-mindedly as she was pinned aggressively into a particularly ornate green gown, casting pleading looks at Aearis.

The final vision, though undeniably beautiful, was so unfamiliar as to be entirely alien. Tall, still, lissome, draped in shimmering cascades of translucent green, Bereneth glowed with the tragic loveliness of a willow. Her auburn hair, loose and shining with silver beads, framed her pale face, and her eyes were bright as a sunlit stream. She was a woodland treasure, cut and polished by skilled hands until she sparkled with the subtle fire of a Noldorin gem. The sight of her in her molded perfection plucked a deep, sad chord in Aearis's heart. To what fate had she led her wonderful, faithful friend?

As she was beckoned to stand before the tall, ornate mirror, her eyes lingered on Bereneth even as the attendants began the work of stripping away her modest linen dress and remaking her in a new image. They dressed her in bright white, the mourning color of Numenor. The bodice swept low, almost scandalously low, to hint at the swell of her distinctly un-elven breasts, then cinched in dramatically at her waist. The skirts floated down over her hips to whisper around her feet, each layer of fabric so light that it might have been woven out of mist. No beading burdened the weightless garment, but embroidery of vivid spring flowers wound up from the hem to curl around her hips and waist and frame her exposed shoulders and throat. Most pleasing to Aearis were the sleeves of transparent silk, which were gathered at her wrists. To showcase the delicacy of her bones, Rhossorieth had claimed, but Aearis suspected that she feared a repetition of the scene with the carving knife.

Her hair they arranged with painstaking care, setting each curl to tumble in perfect, aggressively choreographed disarray. Her brows and lashes were blackened, her lips and cheeks reddened. The woman in the mirror, wild, voluptuous, and exotic, had the air of a corsair queen, a sense of dangerous, sweeping romance. That woman, whoever she was, was powerful and fascinating, a stranger from a far-off land.

Rhossorieth approached and stood behind her, appraising her work. She seemed satisfied, almost complacent.

"Welcome, Aearis Singeareth. Welcome to Lindon."

* * *

The Sea-Salt Girl, they called her. Singeareth. So went the whispers that floated through the court like dandelion seeds. Untraceable, feather-light rumors that alighted upon the ear and dripped heady expectation.

She had been seen upon the ferry, barefoot and half-feral. She had driven an inn full of sailors into a frenzy of revelry from which they awoke the next morning with nothing but the sweet taste of a pleasant dream. She had called down a storm to sing her to sleep. She could enslave the minds of Men and even lesser elves with but a single word. She was followed always by a pale, grim shieldmaiden and a demon dog, who haunted her footsteps, caught in the thrall of her Voice. It was said that even Lord Glorfindel, poor Lord Glorfindel, was not immune to her unnatural power. That he had passed twenty years under the eaves of her bower, entranced and insensible to duty. She was charmingly naive. She was dangerous and calculating. She was a nameless bastard. She was the exiled heir to the Numenorean throne. She was mortal. She was Elven.

"You do know how to cause a stir, Rhossorieth," said the one with the star-bright eyes. "What if the girl cannot live up to her reputation? Is she all that you say she is?"

"I do not intend to disappoint," she replied, returning his sharp smile. "She may not yet be all that I would wish. But she is a performer, and she will become what the stories say she is, or she will die trying."

* * *

The Palace of Mithlond rested upon the tallest foothill of the Blue Mountains. It floated in a wreath of shimmering mist as though nestled in the heavens and built from woven clouds. Spires of shining white stone pierced the sky recklessly, delicate and powerful. The walls were polished smooth and lustrous as a looking glass, and each pillar was carved in the likeness of a great Noldorin hero of old. Songs of power ran through the foundations of it, subtle and unbreakably strong. It was blinding. Perfect. So beautiful as to be painful to look upon.

Cestedir had departed soon after they had settled into Glorfindel's estate, carrying news of Noenor's death back to Faeleth as she waited in Imladris for her husband's return. A heavy pall stretched over the remaining three.

"You have been so very quiet, my lord," said Aearis as they approached the palace gates. After careful deliberation, Rhossorieth had determined that they would do best to arrive on horseback. A carriage was too fussy an indulgence to suit their dashing image. So they rode upon tall, proud, half-wild Lindon stallions who would bear no tack or saddle. It was extraordinarily uncomfortable.

"What would you have me say, my lady?" Glorfindel replied, his eyes fixed forward.

_I would have you _**_look _**_at me, you obstinate bastard. _

"A word or two of admiration would not go amiss. Does not Bereneth look uncommonly lovely today?"

Bereneth actually leaned over to jab Aearis hard in the ribs, leveling a warning look at her.

_Don't you dare bring me into this._

"Bereneth always looks uncommonly lovely. Why should today be any different?"

"Ah, of course, your purity of mind transcends all earthly trifles. All adornment is as nothing to you, O paragon of-"

A second jab, directed at a chink in the protection of her bodice, silenced her with a sharp wince. If Glorfindel noticed the silent scuffle that ensued as Aearis tried in vain to retaliate, he made no indication, and his eyes remained firmly upon the road ahead of him.

Rhossorieth met them at the palace gates and greeted them each by name in a ringing voice. Glorfindel greeted her with the barest pretense of civility. Their horses were spirited away by undetectable servants the instant that they dismounted, and they were left standing among the elegant nobles, a sparkling sea that rippled as heads turned discreetly towards them.

As they followed Rhossorieth into the first courtyard, Aearis found herself reaching unconsciously for Bereneth's hand and stopped herself. She felt so small that she worried she might slip through a crack in the stone. But there were no cracks.

Then the song of the fountains reached her. Nine clear, ringing voices weaving an ardent harmony. The central font, carved in the image of Ulmo himself, attended by Uinen and Osse, took her breath away with the sheer scale, for it towered taller than five Men and sang out with the ferocity of a caged storm. Each of the remaining eight, arranged evenly around the octagonal courtyard, glittered with its own image of the sea, so lifelike that Aearis could almost feel the ground rolling beneath her.

But Rhossorieth led them quickly through the courtyard, nodding graciously to the courtiers who dropped into deep bows and curtseys as they passed, though their bright eyes remained fixed on the newcomers with hungry intensity.

The palace doors swung open with smooth, perfect silence. But their motion resonated through the floor and up through Aearis's feet, shuddering through her rib cage.

A strange feeling flared in her chest. Bright, and hot, and humbling. It had not the terror of love or the urgency of desire. No. With a jolt, she named it. _Reverence._

The palace was no mere show of wealth or political might or even of beauty. This palace was _music_, so perfect in every detail that the trueness of it sang in her. It was a symphony of pure, uncorrupted power. She trembled slightly with the exhilaration of it as she followed the silver lady, heedless of the murmurs, the sidelong glances, the silk-veiled scrutiny that followed them like a spector through the halls. Heedless even of Glorfindel's palpable tension behind her, where he bristled with restrained hostility like a shackled lion.

The path was long, and her eyes became fixed, completely captured, by the figure seated at the far end of the final room. _Magnificent. _

He was draped upon his throne of mithril and velvet with the languid beauty of one born to greatness. His clothes were understated, but resplendent in their simplicity, serving his dazing beauty with quiet elegance. On his brow glimmered a delicate circlet constructed of Noldorin diamonds, a constellation that framed his burning eyes. King Gil-Galad, the stuff of song. The guiding light of the Noldor. The king crowned in stars.

Dimly she was aware of their names on the lips of an extraordinarily handsome herald. Singeareth, they called her here. Aearis, Gwingien, Melethien, Singeareth. So many names, none her own. But then _he_ stood, and there fell a silence so perfect that even the wind seemed to hold its breath.

"So at last the fabled travelers come to my halls. Well met, Lady Bereneth Amathiel, daughter of the Woodland Realm. Welcome, Lady Aearis of the distant shore. And to Lord Glorfindel, Lion of Gwathlo, _welcome back_." This last greeting was spoken in a different tone than the others. Not quite reproving, but oddly proprietary, like a father addressing a straying son.

They knelt before him, heads bowed. She felt his approach with the same prickling instinct that might warn her of a wolf in the shadows. A pale, long-fingered hand appeared in her line of sight. She took it and rose, meeting his eyes slowly.

"Well met, your Majesty," she replied, amazed to find her voice still intact under his blazing stare. "Indeed, I am most pleased to know you by name at last. After all," she said with a smile that he matched, avid and fierce with all his teeth showing, "you still have my flute."

* * *

**Author's notes:**

So clearly I'm completely inventing almost everything about Lindon. As far as I know there are no detailed sources describing Gil-Galad's realm, but I would be very happy to be wrong about that if anyone can point me to material on the topic.

Also, I spent some time trying to sort through Gil-Galad's parentage, which seems to be something about which Tolkien wasn't terribly decisive. So I'm going with the account that he was the brother of Finduilas, who was killed after the sack of Nargothrond. For the curious, the pertinent story would the the Children of Hurin, either in the Silmarillion or the expanded version. It's all just very, very sad.

On another note, I highly recommend looking up videos of Argentine tango. Mostly because it's beautiful, but also because it's what I'm using as inspiration for Numenorean dancing. I like the idea of total improvisation clashing with a society where everything is choreographed by millennia of tradition.

**Translations**

Thalwest: steady oath

Lillameril: Dance of Roses

Singeareth: sea-salt woman


	17. Bloodsports

'"I give her sadness,

And the gift of pain,

The new-moon madness,

And the love of rain."

And little good to lave me

In their holy silver bowl

After what she gave me-

Rest her soul!'

-"Godmother," Dorothy Parker

There was a gap.

In the inner wall of the Courtyard of Nine Voices, just beyond Elwing's Fountain, cleverly hidden behind climbing silver-leaf vines. At first she had dared think it a mistake-a single, unobtrusive hole in the Noldorin perfection. But later, when the courtyard had emptied and she had found a moment to slip behind the winged lady, to run her fingers over the cold stone, the little gap-hip-high and so narrow that only a child or an exceptionally slim adult might slip through sideways-breathed a welcome to her with the fragrance of flowers.

The vines moved aside for her, a little reluctant and suspicious but pliant under her fingers. They clung to her torso as she found herself easing through. And, then, it seemed, she was somewhere else entirely, far from the blinding courtyard and the singing water, far from the glinting, lethal king, from Glorfindel's bristling protection. From Aearis, flushed and thrumming with power, her excitable fëa flickering outward to burn ravenously at all it touched. Here, in this little gap in the unyielding beauty of it all, Bereneth was alone.

Behind the gap all was shadow, welcoming and impenetrable. But still a spectral image of the courtyard in all its oppressive brilliance floated before her eyes. She leaned against the cool stone at her back and waited patiently for her eyes to adjust to the pressing dark. There was a subtle shimmer of sound, of gentle motion. Slowly, rarified light trickling through the gap began to reveal her surroundings. A slender rill cut a gouge through the stone floor, flowing out of the shadows towards the courtyard before ducking abruptly underground, as though struck with sudden shyness at the prospect of meeting the sun. She set aside her useless silk slippers neatly-_ who would have thought that I would lose my shoes before Aearis?- _raised her skirts, and plunged her feet into the water. It was cool and surprisingly deep, swirling around her knees in effusive welcome.

She waded upstream, relishing the tingle of the current rushing over her skin, the slight chill of the still air, the tranquil blindness of the unlit passage. But slowly, ever so slowly, the shadows began to retreat as a pale light dawned over her path and set the stream alight with dancing golds and greens. The rill wound around a corner, and ahead there appeared an archway, glowing as it seemed to float in the midst of the perfect darkness. The warmth of it pressed into her skin and a breath of wind stirred the air and carried with it the heavy scent of springtime blooms, so thick that she could taste the sweetness on her tongue. She emerged blinking, disoriented, almost drunk with the color and fragrance that rushed to embrace her.

She was in a garden, wild and overgrown and not more than twenty paces across in any direction. Flowering vines and fruit-laden brambles ran rampant, spreading greedily over the walls and ground, ensnaring her affectionately with their playful tendrils. A cobblestone path, now little more than a tentative suggestion of civilization, was cracked and disrupted by veins of springy moss and eruptions of slender grasses. And at the center of this savage little rebellion was the spring from which the guiding rill flowed, pouring forth from the earth to form an ever-rippling pool that caught the blue of the sky at the crest of each propagating ring. Clear, bright water bubbled from the ground, its singsong laughter mingling with birdsong and rustling leaves.

All was verdant, vivid, mouthwatering. Suddenly, heedlessly joyful, Bereneth settled at the bank of the spring and dipped her hand into the shallow pond, watching tadpoles darting around her fingertips and jewel-bright dragonflies dancing across the water's surface in their lustful springtime mating frenzy.

And so she stayed under a bower of green and gold, lulled by the songs of the furtive garden, until gray twilight dimmed her trance and, in the distance, the chill ring of a bell summoned her back.

Dinners at the palace were a discordant combination of levity and tension. The great hall furnished a single, extraordinarily long table of extravagant beauty, and it quickly became clear that the arrangement of each seat was a matter of supreme importance to those fortunate and favored enough to be seated at the King's table.

The precise meaning of each shift in position was far too elaborate for any newcomer to fully understand. Generally speaking, however, it seemed that moving up the table, closer to the King, was _good, _while any movement down the table was decidedly not.

Over the course of a single week, Bereneth witnessed several courtiers of insufficiently scintillating wit or unimpressive sartorial choices slip down in the seating arrangements until, one by one, they vanished, to be replaced by new, lovelier attendants. Left to her own devices, Bereneth would gladly have allowed her reserved nature to push her slowly into obscurity, until she was allowed to disappear from the glittering milieu and return to the peace of Glorfindel's house in Harlond. But it was not to be, for Aearis was seated just across the table, and her incandescent spirit lit them both with the glow of the new and interesting. She talked educated trivialities with the pleasing, ingenuous hunger of a young scholar, flattering and challenging her companions with delightful sincerity even as her uncommon, almost lascivious beauty hypnotized them.

And so, each night Aearis and Berenth found themselves advancing gradually up the long table. Bereneth's skin prickled with ever more nervous electricity. But Aearis rose, and she followed.

And at the head of the table, mesmeric and frightening, Ereinion Gil-galad, with Rhossorieth at his right and Glorfindel at his left, glorious as heros of old. When she had been a girl, Bereneth had seldom thought of the lofty, distant king except as a figure of legend. Guiding star of the Noldor, bane of the Enemy, leader of the Wise, slayer of dragons. Accounts of him in Eryn Galen, Pelargir, even Imladris, had always been so wildly outsized and conflicting as to be nearly useless. All she had known for certain from all the tales of his beauty, his ferocity, his ruthlessness, his battle thirst, was that she hoped with all her heart never to encounter him in the flesh.

But for all her reservations, for all her rising anxiety, Bereneth could not deny that there was something in the air of Lindon. Something ancient and grand, something that drove the spirit to hopes of high glory. So when, three weeks after their first appearance in court, Rhossorieth summoned Aearis and Bereneth to her study, a room at the summit of one of the palace spires, she attended readily, almost eagerly.

The long, slippery climb up the spiraling marble staircase might have been tinged with apprehension, even dread, if Aearis had not been with her. She had seemed positively feverish since they had arrived in Lindon, and now she seized Bereneth's hand and bounded up the stairs three at a time.

"Finally, a staircase without witnesses. I thought I would go mad if I had to walk at a _ladylike _pace for one second more!" she exclaimed breathlessly.

"I suppose I should count myself lucky that you chose to take the stairs at all rather than scaling the side of the tower." Aearis stopped and turned abruptly.

"You know, I hadn't even thought of that. What is becoming of me? I imagine the walls are likely too smooth even for me, but it couldn't hurt to try…"

Before this particularly dangerous train of thought could take hold, Bereneth raced ahead, dragging Aearis with her. They arrived flushed and panting at Rhossorieth's door, but the two guards who stood stock-still at the landing were far too well-trained to stare, and let them pass without comment.

The round room was bright, with a high ceiling and large windows, built of polished white stone laced with silver veins. Shelves of rich, dark wood were neatly populated by beautifully bound volumes and a few well-placed artifacts of clear historical significance. The whole room was decorated with the same expressionless elegance that marked Rhossorieth's every touch.

And, delicately arranged as a bouquet of silk flowers, the lady herself, seated in a chair upholstered in deep blue velvet. She appeared deeply absorbed in a long scroll, and Bereneth noted that the wax of the broken seal was green with silver shavings-the official seal of the Woodland Realm. She did not look up as they entered, but gestured them to take seats beside a fresh tea tray. Aearis instantly set to serving the tea, mostly, Bereneth suspected, in order to occupy her hands. They sat in silence save for the clinking of porcelain for about thirty seconds longer than was strictly comfortable before Rhossorieth set aside the scroll and bestowed a perfect smile on each of them. Yet Bereneth dared imagine that the silver lady looked just a little tired, that her serenity had slipped just a hair to reveal a hint of worry.

"Thank you for coming, Bereneth, Aearis. I trust you are settling in well?"

Bereneth allowed Aearis to answer the question, let her judge the precise amount of pleasant nonsense that was due before they could come to the point.

"How delightful," Rhossorieth replied when Aearis paused to breathe. Then, preamble over: "It is time, I think, that we find occupations for you." She caught the expression of relief that passed over Aearis's face and smiled with more feeling. "The King likes his courtiers to make themselves useful to the realm. Idle entertainment is all very well for a season, but we all owe a duty to the people of Lindon. Aearis, I have taken the liberty of arranging an introduction to Lord Angolor, chief composer for the King's minstrels-"

"You are very kind, my lady, but I am well-acquainted with Lord Angolor already. If I may, I have not yet had the honor of meeting Lord Ristoron, who I hear is too much occupied with the healing halls in Mithlond to attend the court…"

Rhossorieth regarded Aearis impassively for a long moment, and though she fell silent, the girl held her gaze.

"Your voice, Aearis, is a great gift. With the proper shaping, you could wield it to do immense good. But you shall never reach your full potential without the hand of a proper teacher guiding you in the ways of Song."

"Then let me do both, my lady. Surely if my skill in songs of power improves, my usefulness in the healing halls shall as well."

"You speak of two of the most rigorous occupations in all of Lindon. One alone might easily exhaust you. To apply yourself properly to both at once might very well be fatal."

"I have been split in half since birth. I can take it." Rhossorieth appeared unimpressed by this argument. Aearis sighed and her expression of mulish determination softened slightly. "I have heard rumor of the healing halls, my lady. That they are constantly short-handed. That healers are lost in battle and cannot be replaced. That some have even faded from the strain. Can you truly expect any student of Elrond's to stand by and sing songs while there is such need for succor?"

Rhossorieth remained perfectly still for a moment, keen eyes boring deep into Aearis's.

"Your skills as a healer will have to be evaluated," she said finally. "Ristoron is an exacting and uncompromising man.*"

"I would expect nothing less."

"Angolor will not tolerate anything less than full commitment to his lessons. And your attendance in court will still be expected."

"I never sleep much."

Rhossorieth opened her mouth to raise another objection, then closed it. She scrutinized the restless girl for a long, fraught moment.

"It would be a great waste if you died of exhaustion," she mused.

"Let me worry about that," Aearis replied, smiling brightly. Bereneth could not quite restrain herself.

"Aearis," she interjected, more irritably than she intended, "_ everyone _will worry about that. Do as you will-Valar know you always do. But at the very least, you must give us leave to feel as _we _will."

"Wise words," Rhossorieth said. Her smile was distinctly laced with sadness now. "I concede, Aearis, that it would be of great value to gain a healer and an enchantress at one stroke. But I will not trade your life for a momentary advantage in a war without end." Rhossorieth turned to Bereneth and raised a brow. "And I suppose you will insist on some noble nonsense as well."

"I believe I could be of service in the army, if it is permitted, my lady," Bereneth replied. Rhossorieth sighed heavily in a way most unlike her and passed a hand over her eyes.

"It will be permitted if I say so."

"And will you?" Rhossorieth paused, eyes flickering between Aearis and Bereneth.

"Is this how I am to repay my life debt to Lady Gimlith? By sending both her daughters to an early grave?" Aearis grinned cheerfully and leaned forward to refill the cups.

"She would be the last to reproach you on that front, I assure you. We are notoriously difficult to keep alive." Rhossorieth drained her tea in a single gulp and rose, moving to her desk. She produced from a drawer a stout glass bottle filled with a rich amber liquid. As it splashed into her delicate porcelain cup, it released a scent of fire and fragrant wood.

"So I am beginning to realize."

She drank, deeply.

* * *

_2883 SA _

The thick, lustrous fur of her cloak fought off the winter's chill heroically as she made the familiar trek from the healing halls back to the palace, but as she walked Aearis found herself trembling violently.

It would never do. She could not play a lute with her hands shaking so, and if Angolor reported her symptoms to Rhossorieth, or worse, Glorfindel… Aearis stopped in her tracks and took a deep, shuddering breath, closed her eyes, and retreated deep into the tower that Ristoron had taught her to build at the center of her mind. Contained within the walls of stone, she examined her fëa, all jagged tears and singed edges. But the tremors stopped, at least for the moment, and she walked on.

She was halted again, however, when she passed the training grounds. A warrior she did not recognize, wearing only light riding clothes and a green hood that obscured his features in a haze of subtle magic, was sparring with Lagor, a swordsman so skilled that, in only his third _yen _of life, he had already been made a captain in the army. But the hooded stranger fought with fluid grace and Lagor was on the defensive. A large audience had congregated at the perimeter of the training field, and the King himself stood with Rhossorieth at the front. His face was arranged in an expression of detached amusement, but Aearis thought she saw a glitter of displeasure in his eyes. Curiosity piqued, she pushed her way indecorously to the front of the crowd to stand beside him. Indeed, she had been correct-from up close, Gil-galad exuded a palpable sense of intense irritation.

"Does something vex you, your Majesty?" she asked, every bit the solicitous courtier. Rhossorieth shot her a warning look and shook her head minutely. Gil-galad spared her a brief, sardonic glance before returning his eyes to the match.

"Two years in my court, should you not have learned to simper more convincingly?"

"Would that please my king?"

Lagor's guard slipped as he made a reckless thrust, and Green-hood's sword nicked his chest, marking the end of the match. Odd. Lagor's guard _never _slipped. Bereneth had spoken often and at length on the topic. Lagor was practically untouchable, except perhaps by Glorfindel.

"Every time, that insolent brat imposes on my soldiers-"

"Your majesty," Rhossorieth interjected sharply, "_ please. _"

Green-hood defeated two more soldiers. Both went down far too easily, making foolish mistakes that no warrior of Lindon would ever countenance.

"Who is he?" Aearis asked finally when she could no longer restrain her curiosity.

"Prince Thranduil of Greenwood," Gil-galad gritted out, eyes flashing. "Now and then his father sends him here with a diplomatic delegation, and he takes it into his wooden head to challenge my soldiers to a tournament."

"Ah. And no one with an ounce of sense would dare draw blood from King Oropher's heir," she completed the explanation, barely containing a smile. "I have heard of his majesty's royal temper."

"He always comes with the most ludicrous disguises, but of course everyone knows by word of mouth when the Prince of Greenwood is in Lindon."

"That indeed is a grievance, your majesty. What a cruel affliction to have the sanctity of your blood sports so compromised." Gil-galad turned to look down at her severely, brows raised.

"Are you perfectly sure that this is the tone you wish to employ with your monarch, Lady Aearis?" he asked courteously.

"Ah, forgive me, majesty. Would you prefer I avoided drawing blood?"

The corner of his mouth twitched. She was safe.

The next competitor entered the field. With a painful leap of the heart, Aearis recognized Bereneth beneath the thin shirt of mail and modest helm. She stood tall and proud, just another soldier of the realm. She appeared to be freshly returned from her mission on the outskirts, for the red dirt of the eastern road still stained her boots. A terrible thought occurred to Aearis. Did Bereneth know the identity of the hooded challenger?

She was walking forward before she had finished the thought, but she was restrained with a vice grip on her wrist. Gil-galad's eyes were fixed on the field, and a new note of savage excitement lit his eye.

"Release me, majesty, unless you will defend her from King Oropher's wrath." She flinched as the first great clang of swords meeting rang out.

"She will come to no harm, my lady, while she resides in my realm. Now hush. I want to enjoy this."

The prince was broad-shouldered and powerfully built, yet he moved quickly and beautifully. But Bereneth was quicker still, so light upon her feet that she moved through the mist like a specter. She parried and evaded as he lunged and attacked, and his patience wore thin as he pursued. The fight wore on, long and elaborate, and with each blow, his recklessness grew and his arm tired. Then, she feinted and he faltered, and the brief opening was all she needed. He crashed to the floor with her sword at his throat and one muddy heel resting upon his chest.

Dead silence fell over the crowd. They watched in collective apprehension as Bereneth sheathed her sword and extended her hand to help her opponent to his feet. He hesitated for a moment, then took it. The red print of her boot stood out starkly against the white cotton of his shirt, and Aearis was torn between glowing pride and abject horror.

The fighters removed their headpieces. Bereneth's auburn hair, sticky with sweat though it was, shone nevertheless under its mantle of silver stars, and with a flush in her cheeks and a sparkle in her eyes, she looked so beautiful that she seemed to drive back the mist. Slowly, her opponent pushed back his hood to reveal his bright blond hair, his noble brow and finely angled features and, most importantly, his circlet of silver leaves and emeralds.

They gazed at each other for an uncomprehending moment. Then, quite suddenly, Thranduil began to laugh.

* * *

"Come now, ladies, won't you give us another song?" Thranduil's melodic voice was roughened around the edges slightly by the strong ice wine. He tugged lightly at the fabric of Aearis's sleeve and fixed her with an entreating gaze until she smiled and obliged him again.

It cost Glorfindel every ounce of his considerable self control not to lift the wild, handsome elven prince by his throat and hurl him into a marble pillar. But, as he reminded himself daily now, he was old and wise and not in the habit of assaulting the royalty. So he settled for swishing his own wine irritably in its heavy crystal chalice and watching from the corner of his eye. She looked terribly pale, almost consumptive.

In moments when she thought no one was watching, he had seen a tremor in her fingers. But they always seemed to steady in time for her next song.

And so it was now. As she struck the first chord, patches of color bloomed in her cheeks and a fervent light came into her eyes. Her fëa flared out, savage and injured and lovely, as her voice mingled with Bereneth's. Her eyes met his, but only for a moment.

"How marvelous. She never seems to stop, does she?" Glorfindel's fingers tightened around the delicate stem of his goblet as Gil-galad approached to stand beside him. "I could scarcely ask for more from any subject." Baited despite his resolve, Glorfindel found himself replying before he could entirely recover his composure.

"Scarcely? And what more _would _you ask, majesty?" The last word came out more as a curse than an honorific.

"Worry not, old friend. I am not, I think, a greedy man. I am quite content with her as she is now. But in a perfect world, I suppose, an advantageous marriage…" he trailed off as his eyes flickered to Thranduil, draped carelessly upon a bench in the cloistered courtyard as Aearis and Bereneth played to him. "She would be sure to charm in Greenwood's court if she could hold her tongue long enough to survive Oropher's temper. He hasn't my sense of humor, you know."

For a moment, Glorfindel thought to protest that Aearis would never agree to such a match. But then, with a chill, he recalled her distinctly unromantic remarks on the topic of political marriages.

"I find it hard to believe that you would willingly surrender a promising sorceresss to the Woodland Realm," he replied instead in a voice of forced calm.

"Indeed, you are wise as ever," Gil-galad agreed with a slight bow and a small, cruel smile. "She is of far greater utility here. Perhaps _I _should marry her."

The delicate music that filled the air was marred by a sudden, discordant noise-the explosive shattering of crystal. Glorfindel turned instinctively to look at Aearis before sharp, shooting agony in his right hand drew his attention back. His ever-tightening grip had crushed the fine crystal goblet, and he stared for a moment with grim fascination as red dripped down his forearm, wine mingling with blood. Across the flowering garden, Aearis and Bereneth broke off their song and surged to their feet. Glorfindel smiled reassuringly at them and spoke quickly through his teeth as they approached.

"If you are trifling with her, Ereinion, no title, no army, no-" Gil-galad met his ire with a derisive smile.

"You are not worried that I am trifling with her. You are worried that I am _not _. That in your inaction, another, braver man will attain what you dare not take for yourself. Well, worry not on that count. She would be wasted on a throne."

"Glorfindel, what on earth-" Aearis began at the sight of his brutalized hand. He recovered his composure instantly, relaxing into an attitude of mildly embarrassed amusement.

"The beauty and curse of a strong vintage, my lady, nothing more. I do seem to forget my own strength under the power of good wine."

Aearis levelled her most potent aggrieved-healer scowl at him, breaking it only when Bereneth turned to curtsey deeply to the king and she followed suit a split second later.

"Forgive me, majesty, but I should treat this now. Bereneth, perhaps you could warn away the squeamish." So saying, she seized Glorfindel's wrist in a shockingly powerful grip and towed him unceremoniously to a well-lit stone table. She bid him sit in a severe tone. He sat. Bereneth and Gil-galad trailed after them, Bereneth watching with apprehension, Gil-galad with mild interest. Without any apparent embarrassment, Aearis set her foot on the bench beside Glorfindel, raising her skirts far higher than any laws of propriety would ever permit. Strapped there, just above her knee was a small leather pack. Above the pack, a sheath was holstered flush against her thigh. Her dagger, Echiar.

This woman was, beyond a shadow of a doubt, intended to be the death of him. He dimly wondered why the Valar had gone to all the trouble of resurrecting him at all. They did have a strange sense of humor.

"No need to look quite so horrified as that," she said, catching Glorfindel's eyes with a heart-stopping smile. "I just like to feel prepared." She herself sat on the table in front of him and opened her satchel, withdrawing bandages and an array of glass bottles and fine metal instruments.

Glorfindel's hand rested in her lap, staining her delicate white skirts with a spreading pool of scarlet. He cleared his throat and tried very hard not to think about the way she pushed her thick hair over one shoulder, baring her shoulder and throat. He found himself amply distracted by the sharp pain when she plucked the first shard of glass from his palm, and winced despite himself, jerking back. She rolled her eyes and reached for a small vial, which she shook vigorously before uncorking it.

"Lion of Gwathlo indeed," she muttered, sprinkling its contents over the afflicted area. It burned for a moment, then blissful numbness spread over his palm. The next shard she removed barely caused a twinge, and he found himself once again without respite from the intoxicating nearness of her.

"The guards might have some objections to a lady of the court carrying concealed weapons in the palace," Glorfindel observed in a neutral tone. Aearis appeared undisturbed and eased a particularly long sliver from the center of his palm.

"A cultural difference, I suppose. In Andustar, daggers are worn proudly in court. Beautiful, decorative ones, of course, but effective if the need arises." Gil-galad's brows rose slightly

"Oh? And does the need often arise?" At this, the steady work of Aearis's hands faltered briefly and her brow furrowed.

"Not often, your majesty, no. But once was enough." She plucked another shard. "At any rate, I could do far less damage with two daggers than Lord Glorfindel can, apparently, with his bare hands."

"I suppose that if they wished to disarm you, they should have to cut out your tongue," Glorfindel said impulsively. She faltered again and raised her eyes to his.

"Indeed, my lord, perhaps there would be wisdom in that. My words have caused a great deal of harm, and much of it undeserved." She held his gaze, allowed him to explore fully the depth of the regret suddenly laid bare in her eyes.

"I think not," he replied, though his voice rasped slightly in his throat. "Silence is a far crueler cut than hasty words could ever inflict."

Her lips parted in the beginnings of a smile and as she turned her eyes back to her task, the hand that held his steady seemed to grasp him a little more tightly.

* * *

Spring of 2884 brought an onslaught of violent thunderstorms and torrential downpours to sweep in on Lindon from the sea. The air shivered with electric charge, and heavy rains pierced Aearis's skin with the wild beauty of the songs they brought from distant lands. The weariness that had haunted her for the last two years lifted slightly, chased away by the exhilaration of the tempests coursing through her blood.

On a still, gray morning, tense with the anticipation of another storm, Aearis climbed to the highest battlements of the palace and let the sweat freeze on her skin.

"I thought I might find you here. But beware, storm-charmer. It is possible to climb too high too quickly, even for you."

She whirled around. Even in the dim gray light, Gil-galad glittered. The painful, addictive thrill of his voice set her skin tingling, and in her dazed state it took her a moment to notice that he held a small chest of bright mithril, that shone in his hands like a captured moon. But the moment her eyes fell upon it, she could not tear them away. It sang to her with a voice of sparks.

"Ah, I see that it calls to you, as indeed it does to me." She heard the smile in his voice, wonderful and lethal, but could not look away from the little box. He opened it slowly, teasingly, as impatience mounted behind her ribs like physical pressure. She wanted to rip it out of his lovely fingers and entwine herself with the voice within, but she stayed perfectly still, restraining the sudden hunger.

Inside was a single point of light. Red it was, like a bloodthirsty forest blaze. Or was it blue, like lightning? Or white and gold as a hearth? Her eyes could not quite focus upon it to see its form, but nor could she look away from the strange little glimmer nestled upon its bed of velvet. It sang its name to her, and she nearly wept with the beauty of it.

"Narya,*" she breathed. Gil-galad stepped closer, and she flinched at the keen, searing pleasure that she felt at its proximity. It drew her nearer until her hand hovered above it, and her fëa burned, painfully, exquisitely. "It sings to me." She forced her gaze away from the box back to Gil-galad, who watched her intently, his expression unreadable. "Why would you show me this?"

"Call the storm," he commanded. The song sprang to her lips with no time for thought, and it rang out from the battlements to rend the sky. She felt the answering harmony begin in the wind, the music at the heart of the world leaping into motion at her lightest touch. She sang out a question, and the lightning answered, painting the air a flickering blue. And then came the rain, and, far from quenching her, it danced over her like fingers of freezing flame. She was permeable, cracked open so that her fëa bled into the world, somehow totally vulnerable and perfectly invincible at once. And inches from her fingertips, Narya sang with her, taught her songs that she would never have dared imagine before.

And when she woke the next morning in her bed in the palace guest wing, she strained to remember the searing power as it had felt spreading out from her fingertips, racing in her throat and coiling in her belly, and even the memory burned her.

Angolor came to fetch her not ten minutes after she awoke, and she followed him through the hall, docile in her distracted state. The throne room was oddly, echoingly empty of the usual flutter of courtiers, servants, and various attendants. Her eyes found Gil-galad first, drawn irresistibly to the brightness of him. He smiled at her, a slow, savage, exhilarating smile. Then she found Glorfindel standing to one side with Rhossorieth, pale and drawn, knuckles white where his great hands were clenched at his sides.

And finally, the strangers. Two elves, a man and a woman, long-limbed and lean. They moved forward to greet her with loping, wolfish grace. Their faces were ageless, with sharp, slanting, beautiful features and pale, restless eyes. Their ears were longer and sharper than any she had seen before, even among the Silvans. Avari.*

They examined her with unembarrassed thoroughness, taking in her face, her hair, her body with long, appraising gazes.

"Too young," said the man finally, and his voice rumbled low and guttural. He was tall as Glorfindel, broad as a bear. The furs that draped over his thickly muscled body seemed to belong to large predators, some that Aearis had never seen or even heard described.

"Too soft," said the woman, hoarse, seductive, dangerous as the purr of a panther. She wore her golden hair shaved at the sides and braided back, and a long, thick scar crossed her brow from her right temple along the bridge of her nose and down to the left corner of her mouth. She was terrible and beautiful. Aearis felt a mad urge to touch the downy golden skin at the base of her ear.

The wild strangers interrupted their scrutiny of her only when the door opened once again and Bereneth slipped in. The willowy soldier took in the scene warily before moving forward and slipping her hand into Aearis's. The warmth of her fingers shocked Aearis's freezing skin.

"I would thank you," said Bereneth quietly, raising her eyes to meet the male elf's gaze squarely, "to back away from my sister. It is rude to stare."

The hunter's eyes narrowed as he evaluated Bereneth, tall, grim, pale, and steady. Her bright gaze bored into him until he took two steps back, inclining his head to her in a gesture of, if not submission, at least respectful concession of territory.

"Moroko," he said, pressing his fist to his breast. "Raka," he said, pointing to his companion, who made the same gesture.

"Bereneth," said the Silvan girl, imitating their greeting. "Aearis." At the sound of her name, Aearis hastened to complete the introductions, dropping Bereneth's hand to lift her fist to her chest.

Raka scrutinized her for a moment longer before turning her back to them both.

"You will help us?" she said to Gil-galad. It was neither a question nor a demand, but something in between. An invitation.

The star-crowned king rose to his feet and descended the seven steps from his throne. Slowly, forcefully, he lifted his fist and brought it to rest against his heart. It seemed answer enough for the Avari.

He met Aearis's eyes and smiled when she quirked a brow at him.

"You once told me that you had no songs to sing of dragons, my lady," he said. To her shock, there was the slightest of tremors in his voice. Not of fear, but of excitement, feverish and urgent. "Now you shall, if you and Lady Bereneth would come hunting with me."

Glorfindel frowned and seemed about to speak, but when his eyes met hers he appeared to think better of it. What had he found there, she wondered.

_Dragons. _The great worms, devourers, mind-twisters. She shivered suddenly, and in her mind's eye she saw again the gleam of Narya. Her heart was thundering, rising to Gil-galad's clarion call. Then, remembering herself, she turned to Bereneth, who smiled at the unspoken entreaty in her eyes.

"Lead on, Aearis. I shall follow."

* * *

*I'm using "man" in dialogue to refer to male elves because for the most part most of the dialogue is assumed to be in Sindarin, which has its own terms form male elf and female elf (ellon and elleth), distinct from male and female human (adan and adaneth). I think these can be distinguished easily enough from context, and usually when I mean male human I capitalize Man in the way that Tolkien tends to.

*Narya: The elven ring of fire. Given that at this point in history, Sauron still had his ring on him, the elven leaders were probably never wearing their rings until the One was cut from Sauron's finger. Tolkien's writing is quite insistently vague on the topic of elven magic, so I'm choosing to view it as a sort of "negotiation" with the natural elements and with the fëar of those around. So for the purposes of this story, I've decided that magic is an act of persuasion. Elves, who are more closely attuned to the life of the elements and the Songs of the world, are sometimes able to create music beautiful enough to influence the world. By extension of that mechanic, the elven rings are like duet partners, singing their own songs that can guide the wielder create new, more potent music.

*Avari: the Refusers, or the "dark elves." This is a topic on which, as far as I know, Tolkien furnished very little definitive information. Genetically, they seem to be a mix of the races that would become the Noldor and the Teleri, who stayed behind after awakening at Cuivienen. Based on the mainly linguistic essay "The Quendi and the Eldar," they seem to have split into a few tribes with distinct languages, all derived from primitive Quenya. So I've done my best to pick names that are just sort of Quenya-ish. As to culture, Noldorin scholars described them as primitive and hostile, but also Noldorin scholars were, by and large, dicks. If anyone has more knowledge of the Avari, I would welcome it!


	18. Pursuit

The letter came with the first messengers of the morning. Small, light, written on commonplace paper. A perfectly unremarkable letter. Glorfindel opened it immediately when he saw the handwriting. His eyes stalled at the first sentence, and he was forced to reread the three lines of untidy script several times over before his mind fully accepted the meaning.

For a brief, crushing moment, he felt every one of his many years. He let his hand drop to his side, leaving his eyes fixed on the west-facing window. It was thus that Bereneth found him. She said nothing, but eased the little paper from his fingers and glanced over it.

"Ai Nienna," she sighed, pressing her open hand over her chest and bowing her head. "Pity the souls that linger here beyond your reach." They stood by the window together, watching the flurry of waking songbirds in silence. Bereneth broke the silence first."Will you tell her?" There was a mild note of exasperation in her tone, as though she already knew his answer.

"Not yet." He met her reproving stare with an apologetic shrug. "Not until this damn hunt is over."

"One of these days, Glorfindel," Bereneth said, fixing him with a piercing stare that he could only imagine she had learned from Gimlith, "you should ask yourself why you lie to her so much."

She turned on her heel and walked away before he could answer, leaving the letter heavy in his hand.

* * *

Aearis slipped out of the palace gates just as night faded into the grey of early morning and the star of Earendil began to rise in the West. The night had been sleepless as ever, but not, as was usually the case, due to the unholy hours of the healing halls or the endless demands for new compositions that Angolor heaped cheerfully upon her. The week before the great hunt had found her eerily and unwillingly idle. She suspected that the king himself had commanded an abrupt cessation of her duties to allow her to prepare for the trial ahead, and she found herself bitterly resenting him for it.

What preparation could there be for such a task? The great Mithlond library had provided her with endless tomes describing ways of dragons, extensive first- and second-hand accounts of their dread deeds and the heroes who had lost their lives-or, even worse, their minds-in battle against them. Brave warriors, faithful and clever and full of purpose. They had died in droves, burned by fiery breath or slashed through with vicious claws or simply caught in frozen terror by mesmeric eyes until they were run through by some lesser servant of the beast.

It seemed a glorious sort of death, if death it was to be, and Aearis thrilled at the prospect of it. But soon after the first eager flush came the sobering chill of conscience. What of Bereneth, who would follow her even into certain defeat? No dissuasion would sway the faithful shieldmaiden from her side, and the responsibility had never weighed so heavily on Aearis's shoulders. _Take care of your sister. _

Yet the fever of Narya burned still in her fingertips, rushing through her veins, and when she quailed under the enormity of the task, that haunting song of fire and storms brought her spirit roaring back.

And was not their hunting party more than the match of any of those warriors of old? Lagor, the young hero of the campaigns in the Misty Mountains, who killed trolls single-handed with his great battering shield and quick feet. Gildor, Rhossorieth's tall, fearless brother, who had fought alongside Glorfindel at the Battle of Gwathlo, singing merrily as he cut down the goblin hordes like wheat. Raka and Moroko, clear-eyed guardians of the forests of Isen. Even Cestedir had promised to return from Rivendell in time to join their party-that above all settled the anxiety that twisted behind her ribs. And, of course, Gil-galad himself, blazing with cold, glorious purpose.

She shivered as she descended the slope from the palace, westwards towards the port of Forlond. Absent-mindedly she reached into her pocket to feel for her silver flute and fixed her eyes upon Earendil, letting his kind, twinkling light settle the jitter of her pulse.

"How shocking. If I didn't know better, my lady, I should have thought that you intended to leave without a proper farewell." Aearis started violently and froze, scanning the trees that lined the wide path. After several seconds of suspense, Prince Thranduil dropped soundlessly from a branch just overhead, landing so that he stood not six inches from her. He favored her with a wide, feline grin. _Bloody wood elves. _

"I should never wish to disagree with you, your highness," she replied, curtseying with an exaggerated, coquettish flutter of her lashes, though her practical riding clothes were ill-suited to the task, "but I am sure I recall _several _farewells at last night's banquet. I believe I played no fewer than seven 'last songs' at your request." He sighed dramatically and fell into step beside her.

"Then why do I still feel so bereft, my lady? Answer me that."

"Are you certain it isn't simply a case of indigestion, highness?" she supplied, enjoying his company despite herself. Thranduil might be spoiled, frivolous cad, but he was a terribly charming one."The symptoms are similar, and you certainly ate a lot of scallops."

"No no, this is another affliction entirely. But tell me, my lady-in your expert opinion as a healer-how am I to endure this cruel deprivation while you are away?" He seized her hand and pressed it to his breast, a trill of exaggerated distress in his voice, though his eyes danced merrily all the while.

"Pray, sir," she laughed, retrieving her hand and settling it instead upon the crook of his arm, "take care, or you shall turn my head with all this flattery." He threw her a knowing, sidelong look.

"I very much doubt that," he replied as they resumed walking at a leisurely pace.

"You think me so heartless, then, that the attentions of a handsome prince would not stir my passions?"

"I think," Thranduil replied, smiling at her mock indignation, "that I might as well pay court to King Gil-galad himself for all the good it would do me." Aearis burst into peals of laughter at the image, and they talked companionable nonsense until the pier came into view.

"I wonder, my lady, if I might ask your counsel once more?" he said suddenly, drawing them to a stop. His tone had altered ever so slightly, and Aearis fancied that she could hear a note of well-concealed vulnerability in it.

"In my capacity as a medic, or as a heartless siren?" she asked, alarmed by the unusual sincerity of his gaze.

"Neither," he said, then hesitated. "Or perhaps both. But mostly in your capacity as Lady Bereneth's closest and most cherished confidant."

Aearis felt a split second's relief, closely followed by a second wave of trepidation.

_Ah_.

"I hoped," he continued, "that you might guide me in how I could turn _her _head. For she is quite impervious to all my usual methods."

Keeping her face carefully neutral, Aearis paused to weigh her words before responding.  
"Well, your highness, I can hardly claim expertise in the matter of Bereneth's heart," she said finally. "But I cannot imagine that _any_ lady is best courted by flirting tirelessly with her sister."

Thranduil gave her a rueful smile.

"On that matter I cannot agree with you, my lady. For she only seems to look at me when I lavish attention upon _you_. I suppose it must be that marvelous competitive spirit of hers…" he trailed off, eyes alight with some pleasant recollection of his lady love.

_Who would have thought that stepping on a man would inspire such adoration?_

She shifted uncomfortably, deeply conflicted. She could hardly deny that it would be a highly desirable match. Bereneth's wisdom, her noble spirit, her fearsome courage, would make her a worthy queen for the Woodland Realm, to say nothing of her connections as one of the few Silvan elves to gain favor in the Noldorin realms of Eriador. And if she could not love Thranduil, could she not at least come to respect him? Certainly her steady hand might do wonders to sober his wildness and caprice. Valier knew she had the practice.

But Bereneth was not meant for a political marriage. Aearis knew it as certainly as she knew that fire burned, that a loveless bond would kill her wonderful sister as surely as swallowing poison.

"I have a rather outlandish idea," she said, "but you must promise not to dismiss it out of hand." Thranduil raised a quizzical brow.

"I hang upon your lips, Lady Aearis," he replied, smiling unapologetically when she rolled her eyes.

"I suggest… " she began, then paused to watch him fidget impatiently. After a long, suitably suspenseful pause, she continued. "I suggest that you address yourself to Lady Bereneth and speak plainly of your interest. My sister has no patience for games or subterfuge, but she does respect honesty. I cannot promise you that she will return your feelings, for I shall not pretend to know her as well as I should. But she will be kind and direct, and at least you will know where you stand."

Thranduil stared at her. She held his gaze.

"Speak directly? In matters of _love_?" he said, speaking slowly with marked disbelief. Then he laughed that unfettered, belly-deep laugh of his and began to walk again. "You are the most marvelous radical, Aearis. I shall miss your eccentric notions terribly. Do try not to get killed, won't you? And return to me my red-haired lady as soon as you are able."

They had reached the pier, where Gil-galad's fleetest ship, Suraranya, the sort of ship that songs were written for, awaited her in the golden light of dawn. The king himself stood upon the deck at the prow, his great spear glinting almost as brightly as his eyes as he looked out over his realm. Gildor and Rhossorieth stood together a little ways off, speaking in low voices. To the untrained observer, she might have been bidding her brother an affectionate farewell, but the tension in their smiles and the flashing of Rhossorieth's eyes told Aearis that they were in the middle of a discreet, bitter argument.

Lagor greeted her with a cheerful grin and a bruising clap on the back after bowing deeply, if slightly reluctantly, to Thranduil. Moroko and Raka watched warily from several paces away. Bereneth had not yet arrived.

Aearis amused herself watching Thranduil and Lagor exchange veiled hostilities until Bereneth finally appeared. And when she did, she was not alone, for she led Dinalagos at her left side and Glorfindel walked at her right. He was dressed in the same practical traveling gear as the rest of him, with a large pack slung over one shoulder and his greatsword, Baradram, sheathed at his hip. His hair was loose and a little wild, billowing around his face like the rays of the rising sun. Her heart leapt, then sank, at the sight of him. She busied herself greeting her large, uncouth dog, who sniffed her nose once before burying his snout deep in her pockets to seek stray morsels.

"Cestedir was unavoidably delayed in Imladris," Glorfindel explained in a flat tone before she could ask. "I shall join in his stead, if Ereinion permits it."

Aearis leveled a questioning look at Bereneth, who shrugged. She might have pressed the matter, but she was forestalled by the king's greeting.

"Hail, Glorfindel," Gil-galad called from the deck of the ship. If he was surprised, he made no sign of it. "Will you join us after all?"

Aearis thought she might have seen a flash of displeasure in Glorfindel's eyes before he bowed deeply, concealing his face. When he straightened, he did not meet her eyes and he regarded his king with blank politeness.

"Gladly, if your majesty will allow it."

Their gazes locked. Gil-galad was smiling that mirthless, beautiful smile of his. Glorfindel was expressionless.

"Of course, my friend! Nothing would please us more! Isn't that right, Lady Aearis?" Forcing a thin, polite smile onto her face, Aearis inclined her head and said something noncommittal before turning her attention back to Thranduil. She nearly laughed out loud at the marked change in the Prince's manner now that he stood in Bereneth's presence. He was absolutely preening, throwing back his shoulders and tossing his head like a showy mare. He had contrived to get hold of the befuddled girl's hand, and she watched with mild bemusement as he bowed over it repeatedly. Aearis allowed the scene to continue for several seconds longer than she really needed to, until Bereneth began aiming increasingly irritable glances in her direction. Finally, after one particularly steely look, she stepped in and disentangled her sister from the over-eager prince.

Thranduil seemed to be of a mind to follow Bereneth onto the ship, but Aearis stopped him with a pointed look.

"Give her a chance to miss you," she whispered in his ear, which he bent obligingly to her lips. "No young lady yearns for he who is ever-present."

He smiled and moved close to whisper to her in turn, his breath dancing over the point of her ear.

"Ah, I take your meaning. Is that why you brush off old Glorfindel so callously?" She started and her eyes darted involuntarily towards the glowing gold warrior. He was ascending the gang-plank with Lagor, joking and laughing with the appearance of perfect cheer.

Rhossorieth approached her, detaining her until the others had boarded Suraranya.

"My lady," Aearis greeted her with a bland smile, bracing herself against a final attempt to dissuade her from the mission ahead.

"Peace," smiled Rhossorieth, raising a hand in a conciliatory gesture. "I know better than to waste my counsel on unwilling ears. Gildor has already quite exhausted me on that front."

"Your counsel is never unwelcome, my lady." Rhossorieth raised a sardonic brow. "Whether I follow it is a separate matter entirely."

"Then indulge me once more, Aearis, when I ask that you know your limits. There may come a time when you cannot win every fight, as inconceivable as that might be to you now."

Behind the admonishment, Rhossorieth's sloe eyes were faintly creased with worry, and her hand twitched as if suppressing the urge to reach out. Aearis bit back the urge to defray the tension with a jest and offered what she hoped was a reassuring smile. Her eyes flickered to Gildor, then Glorfindel and Bereneth, and the same anxiety rooted again in her chest.

"I will defend them with everything I am, my lady. I can promise nothing else."

"That," Rhossorieth pointed out severely, "is more or less the opposite of what I said." She sighed and shook her head. "But I am grateful. Safe journeys, Singeareth."

Aearis bowed deeply to her, then swung herself onto the deck of the ship by the rope that tethered it to the pier and let a wild grin break out over her face.

"Will you take us out, my lady?" Gil-galad bowed to her, a little deeper than usual, and gestured to her to take the helm. She met his glittering, challenging stare and set her hands-mercifully steady-upon the spokes of the great wheel. The smooth, dark wood felt warm and alive under her grip.

A breeze picked up and swelled their sails, and Aearis felt the sea call out to her blood as Gildor weighed anchor. Suraranya seemed to spring to attention, to respond to her lightest touch, as though her very thoughts dictated the ship's motion. The ocean opened out before her as they crossed through the Gulf of Lune into a vast, endless sky.

_Sîr Angren, two weeks later_

The ocean tide and a favorable wind hastened the travelers up Sîr Angren, though the ship's wheel shuddered under her hands from time to time as they navigated the impetuous currents of the river. The coastal sands faded swiftly into deep forest and the air grew hot, wet, and smothering, full of the calls of strange, shrieking birds. At least, Aearis hoped that they were birds.

Dim light filtered through the canopy, falling upon glossy green leaves and complex, brightly-colored flowers that clung parasitically to unlucky trees and released a heavy, sickly-sweet odor like perfume poured over rotting corpses.

The first several days of the voyage passed in uneasy boredom, time marked only by the shifts of the oars and the helm, and by the seemingly endless games of chance that Moroko demonstrated to his captive audience. Most were played with many-sided dice, and required the player to perform wickedly complex calculations in the blink of an eye.

"It seems to me," Aearis observed one day, glaring severely at an unrepentant Moroko after her fifth consecutive loss, "that the odds of this game quite heavily favor the game-runner."

The hunter grinned wide and blindingly white.

"The odds favor the watchful, Maznik. Look. Wait. You will find the pattern when your clever mouth shuts." Aearis shot a questioning look at Raka, who stood leaning against the railing and overseeing the gambling with an expression of mild pity.

"Maznik?" she mouthed. The Avarin woman chuckled, a deep and pleasant sound, like the crooning of rock-doves.

"You will not like it," she cautioned. "You have no proper word for this. The word means 'little-soft.' Like a newborn kitten attacking a leather boot. Fierce, but-"

"Yes, yes, alright," Aearis snapped, waving her hand to forestall the rest. "You were right. I don't like it at all." She turned to Glorfindel, who had shoved what appeared to be an entire apple into his mouth to stifle his laughter "You had better hope someone else is willing to tend to you when you choke on that." He saluted her cheerfully with two fingers.

She fared no better in the next game, and she rose soon after to assume the shift at the oars that she had gained with the rest of her gambling debt. Glorfindel played one more game-which, judging from the colorful curses that floated across the deck, he lost quite thoroughly-before rising to his feet and sauntering over to watch her toil.

"Can I assist you, my lady?" Aearis suppressed a grunt as she pulled the oar. The sweltering, humid air felt absolutely smothering, and the river was swollen by a heavy rain the night before. Keeping pace with Gildor on the other side of the deck had her muscles screaming out for relief. She cursed her stubbornness even as she answered.

"No, thank you. I am quite as capable of rowing as anyone else."

"Oh, certainly," he replied, bowing deeply. "I would never say otherwise."

"Not in so many words," she muttered. He shrugged, then settled down to lean against the mast with a hand draped loosely over his knee and drank deeply from his waterskin. Aearis found her gaze following the droplets of escaped water that trickled from the corner of his mouth down to his jaw and over the sinews of his neck.

"Thirsty?" His voice rumbled with amusement. She swallowed hard and tore her eyes from the place where his crisp white shirt opened out to his chest, settling them instead on the forest. It was restful, letting the negative space between the trees fill her vision, and the burning pain in her arms receded slowly. The shadows here were absolute, impenetrable, but full of hidden intrigue. If she stretched out her fëa to listen-_really _listen-to their rustling whispers, she could just begin to make out the shape of a song. It unwound languorously, beautifully, full of the lazy self-assurance of perfect domination. It was woven into the land like a pulse, and Aearis could hear the groan of the bowing trees, the obsequious murmurs of the leaves, the choked acquiescence of the river.

It was a lullaby. Sweet, tranquil, possessive, protective. She extended a little further to graze the shadows, to part them just a little-there was a flare of panic, aggression, then retreat.

"Aearis." Her name came to her as if from leagues away, spoken urgently as two massive hands gripped her shoulders. The oar had slipped from her hands, and she stared down at her empty palms in fascination. There were four pale, crescent-shaped scars in the raw pink flesh where she sometimes dug in her fingernails too deeply.

"Soft," she heard herself say. An uncompromising grip on her chin forced her eyes up to meet Glorfindel's hard, bright gaze. The last dregs of the strange lullaby boiled away under the intensity of his light.

"What did you see?" he demanded. His nails had dug deep into the skin of her shoulders.

"I thought…" she trailed off, closing her eyes and struggling to recover the impression of the seductive song as it slipped away like water through her fingers. "I heard someone singing." She turned to look into the shadows again, but they remained silent. A cavernous hollowness had settled in her chest, yearning after the elusive song. "It's gone now." Glorfindel did not flinch at the sharp rebuke in her tone.

"This is worse than I thought," he muttered, "If the beast can enchant you even without showing its eyes."

"I'm not enchanted," she snapped, blood rising. "I was listening, that's all."

His finger underneath her chin forced her gaze to meet his again. She winced as he searched her eyes with scorching intensity for what felt like an eternity. Finally, when she thought she could bear the scrutiny no more, he exhaled sharply and stepped back. She nearly stumbled forward when he released his grip, feeling strangely disoriented at the loss of contact.

"You must guard yourself," he sighed, running a hand through his hair. "This is not a friendly realm, it will not do to be so… permeable here."

She opened her mouth before readying an argument, but she was spared whatever nonsense she would have said by Gil-galad's approach. Since they had entered the forest, he vanished frequently into the trees to scout ahead of their path, suffering no company and giving no warning. This habit clearly provoked both Gildor and Glorfindel, but the King paid no heed to their mounting ire. Now the King leapt over the rails, sprightly as a Numenorean sailor, his pupils blown with hunting frenzy, teeth bared in a wide, hungry grin.

"Did you feel it out there, Aearis?" he said without greeting. "The beast is near, I can feel it. The forest shudders with its power."

She met his smile with her own, exhilarated by excitement that radiated from him.

"Yes," she breathed, "its song is unlike anything I've ever heard." Gil-galad drew closer, but Glorfindel stepped between them swiftly.

"Ereinion," he said with a hard edge to his voice, "a word." It was not a request. Aearis watched them retreat into the guts of the ship, both men bristling like hungry wolves.

"If the dragon had better kill us quickly," Gildor murmured as he replaced Aearis at the oar, "or those two will finish each other off before it has the chance."

The first bloodshed came at the end of their fourth day upon the river. All at once, in the middle of the night, all the forest's endless fugue of violent sounds had ceased suddenly in the middle of the night. The heavy, nightmarish silence woke Aearis from her uneasy dreams. She had taken to unfurling her bedroll on the upper deck and sleeping with her back to Dinalagos, whose steady panting and warm, solid form had the strange power to lull her back into fitful sleep when the cruel whispers of the corrupted trees and the polluted river woke her in a panic. But tonight, no power could calm Aearis's fraying nerves when her eyes flew open and the cold sweat on her skin made her shiver and wrap her mother's cloak tight around her shoulders. The air was still and heavy, suffocatingly tense in the absence of the usual fell animal cries.

Then it began. Gently. Sweetly. A song like poisoned honey wine, just at the corner of her consciousness. A slow drip at first, then gaining strength until it rushed down her throat with choking force. She leapt to her feet and grasped blindly for her lute. Her vision was entirely dark, blackened by a night so absolute that not a single ray of star nor moon could penetrate the looming canopy. A huge set of teeth closed around her wrist and she tried to scream, but she could make no sound. But the jaws did not bite down, and instead she found her hand pulled gently rightward, until it rested upon a familiar set of strings.

She tried to say "Thank you, Dinalagos," but still her voice failed under that mantle of unbreachable silence. Her arms were weak. Almost too weak to support the weight of her own instrument. The first chord was too quiet. The second was stronger. Blood rushed back to her faltering fingers and she felt the magic of Elrond's gloves coursing, strong and quiet, through her hands. _Life, and succor, and music. _

The music sprang from her fingertips like welling blood. Somewhere far away in the depths of the forest, she felt something shudder as the silence broke. A breath of cold, pure wind, descended from far above the trees, circled her and stirred the Lorien cloak, set a rush of power kindling in her skin. Her song gained power, grew imperious and commanding. The trees at the bank of Sîr Angren creaked under the sudden rush of swirling breezes that flushed the stagnant air in the canal. The next thing she heard was the heavy patter of sudden rain, drumming upon the thick leaves above them and dripping down to land in gentle droplets on her cheeks. She nearly wept with joy.

She heard a deep, resounding cry, familiar but unidentifiable, and the darkness split at the seams, screaming as it receded from the glowing force that bounded out onto the deck. For a moment, she was paralyzed by the golden light that tore a hole in the permeating night. Then the warmth reached her. Like the first sip of heated whiskey on a cold midwinter evening, it crept down her gullet and spread out to thaw her. Her throat opened and her voice returned, wild and rapturous. Her currents of wind parted the canopy overhead and starlight poured down upon their ship.

As her eyes adjusted to the light, fear returned. The scene that unfolded before her was something out of a terrible dream. Hulking beasts sprang from the trees, their luminous, predator's eyes glowing with feral bloodlust. Dinalagos had leapt forward to engage a great, fanged creature with a feathered crest and a long, reptilian snout. Raka and Bereneth loosed arrow after arrow from their singing warbows, and Moroko's great hammers flashed as he crushed flesh and bone. And at the center, the golden warrior fought beside Gil-galad, who seemed to be formed of the firmament itself. And with each thrust of the High King's great spear, another of the terrible beasts fell dead.

A pool of dark, shining liquid spread steadily across the deck, reflecting the scene of carnage. But her song could not falter. She poured out her spirit to the night, spun her spells around the invading beasts, drove their hearts to burst in terror and their limbs to fail beneath them, and the battle became a rout. When the battle ended, as abruptly as it had begun, the smell of foul blood mingling with the sickly fragrance of the forest flowers overpowered her senses, and she sat down heavily in the seeping blood, her fingers still wandering absently over the strings of her lute.

The golden man knelt before her. The battle-lust had not yet faded from his shining eyes, but he spoke to her slowly, gently, as one might to a frightened child. She might have resented it, but he radiated such pleasant, welcoming heat. Instead, she lurched forward towards him like a moth, dropping her lute carelessly into the pooling ichor where it landed with a reprimanding twang of strings. He caught her and held her as she clung greedily to his torso. He invoked her true name softly, and his voice rang through her veins with compelling force, awakening her from the dreamlike horror suddenly and completely.

"What happened?" she whispered, her voice hoarse from the exertion.

"The beast's influence extends further than we guessed," he replied, speaking into her hair and gripping her more tightly with each word. "This part of the forest obeys his will completely."

"Is anyone hurt?" She could tell instantly from the tensing of his shoulders that the answer was not a happy one.

"The dragon's influence was too much for Lagor," he replied after a moment's pause. "He woke in the grip of madness and drew his sword on Gildor. They are both alive, but-"

"Where is he?" She had broken free and seized her lute before she had finished asking the question.

He sighed and followed her down, leading her to the quarters that the two elves had shared for the duration of the voyage. Lagor was bound hand and foot to his bed, and a single bloody lump was rising at his temple. His eyes were burning with madness, wide and unseeing. Gildor lay terribly still on his cot, gazing blankly at the ceiling. His tunic had been torn away, and a long, deep gash in his left side had been hastily bound.

"Raka and Bereneth were manning the oars," Glorfindel explained behind her in a soft, sad voice. "I was asleep in the next room when I heard him scream."

Aearis crossed the room to Gildor's bed and began a swift diagnosis. The wound was jagged and prone to persistent bleeding, but it had missed his major organs. She began a shaky song of restoration as she pulled a needle and thread from the satchel at her hip. In the other bed, Lagor thrashed violently at the sound of her song. His fëa was frantic and vicious, like some cornered, feral monster. He was not the courtly, cautious young man she knew. No, he had become something else entirely; some poison had seeped into his very core and changed him, perhaps irrevocably. She had heard tales of possession, of course. Demonic spirits that seized the fëa of the unsuspecting and dominated them, broke down the mind and courage until nothing remained of their victim save an empty, obedient shell. But never before had she felt the evil of it first-hand.

Gildor's body responded readily to her healing song, and she was soon satisfied that the danger to his life had passed, for his spirit was hale and hearty, and he fought for his survival with every ounce of his extraordinary strength. But Lagor's tortured mind slipped under her grasp, eluding her power and falling further and further into dark, unreachable depths. She sang all through the night and the next day, and Glorfindel remained at her side for every moment of it, lending his power as he joined his voice with her healing music. She reached out to the tortured young man with her songs, opened her fëa to his, but Lagor strained against his bonds and spat curses in a dark, ugly language. Sometimes, when Aearis stretched her power to the very brink of exhaustion, the young captain of Lindon seemed to surface for minutes at a time, but he could not see them. He stared blindly into the distance and pleaded for his life with an invisible captor. Then, too soon, he would revert to rage and cruelty. On and on went the struggle, until even Glorfindel was spent.

"He will not be truly freed until the beast is dead," he murmured to her as they stepped out into the corridor, thoroughly defeated. "All the land sways under the dragon's thrall. And I fear that more of us will fall under his spell, unless we find his lair soon."

But the way had grown treacherous, and even Raka and Moroko were disoriented in the depths of the jungle, for the land seemed to shift every night. Aearis passed her nights weaving wards of protection against the venomous whispers that came to them out of the darkness, and her days alternating between ineffectual naps and shifts at the rudder of the great ship. Every day, she felt her strength diminish a little more, sapped by the parasitic hunger of the land around.

But still, the beast itself eluded them. Sometimes a scouting party would return with reports of the faintest sound of slithering on dry leaves, of the strains of a fell song that drifted to their ears on a breath of wind, but nothing that could lead them to their quarry. On the third day after the midnight attack, Aearis found herself unable to sink into even the shallowest sleep, and she relieved Gildor from his post at the rudder soon after dawn. For several hours, she felt blissfully alone, sinking into a sort of numb tranquility.

"This part of the forest was beautiful once." Raka spoke, far too close to her ear, and Aearis had to suppress a jump and a shudder. The Avarin woman moved so silently that even the air seemed to grow still when she approached.

"There is beauty in it yet," she said, but without conviction. True, there was beauty here, in a carnivorous sort of way. But it was impossible to ignore that whisper of death, of a ravening, all-consuming appetite running through the very roots of the trees.

"If you sing, I will take the helm," Raka said after a time. Aearis forced a smile, but she could feel herself turn pale. Since Lagor's flight of madness, she had been singing for hours every night as the others slept, holding off the creeping, insidious voices of the forest nights ever more narrowly. The protective cocoon that she spun around the ship felt more tenuous with each passing night, and the malevolence that pressed in on all sides grew ever more insistent as they sailed deeper into the shadow. When he was not called upon to man the oars or scout the forest beyond, Glorfindel would sit beside her and sing sweet harmonies that wove into her songs and strengthened the fiber of them. She could feel in those moments how generously he gave of his fĕa to feed hers, which buckled with every passing day in this smothering, greedy, draining forest. She felt the river choking on the weeds and dirt, heard the last cries of songbirds' nests before they were consumed by predators that crept and slithered and clambered just out of view, and her own spirit shrank in the face of it. But Glorfindel glowed with his ever-steady light, and his tireless strength nourished her.

She ceded the wheel reluctantly to Raka and drew her lute from its case. Her fingers had grown so raw from strumming that she had taken to wearing Elrond's gloves constantly, even in sleep, when their soothing magic ran through her fingertips and allayed the burning sensation that lingered under the skin.

"You are waning," said the Avarin woman as Aearis began plucking at the strings. She glanced up sharply to find Raka's pale eyes fixed forward into the darkness. "You never sleep. You pace like a…" Raka trailed off, searching fruitlessly for the Sindarin word before reverting to her own language, "_rau _in a cage. In my tribe, we would say that the wind is at your back."

It was the longest speech Aearis had ever heard from the taciturn woman. She kept playing, but softly, searching for words to prompt her to speak more.

"This forest is cruel," she admitted. "It steals my breath."

Raka turned those strange, piercing eyes upon her, and for a moment Aearis felt as though there were cold, searching fingers grasping underneath her skin. Her fingers stuttered and silence fell. With one hand still upon the wheel, Raka reached into one of the many leather satchels on her bandolier and withdrew a small bundle of wrapped cloth. She tossed it to Aearis carelessly, and it fluttered through the air to land weightlessly in her lap.

She was pulling at the ties before she had a chance to pause and think. The white cloth unfurled in her hand to reveal a heart of bright crimson. It was a cluster of small, delicate red blossoms, with petals that crumpled like silk. They released a sweet, mildly spiced fragrance that set her heart racing and her mouth watering.

"They grow to the south of the Angren, in old battlefields," Raka supplied when Aearis raised her eyes to cast her an inquiring glance. "We call it _emerhari_. Mothersblood, in your language."

"What does it do?" Aearis prompted. Raka smiled slowly, and her eyes glittered.

"Burns in the veins," she said. When Aearis looked unsatisfied, she explained her enigmatic statement with the faintest trace of amusement. "Our healers use a tea made from the petals to drive fever and kill contagion," She paused, and Aearis fancied that she saw fleeting hesitation in those merciless eyes. When she continued, the Avar spoke so quietly that Aearis had to lean in to hear her. "But there are... other uses. A drop of emerhari nectar is said to release the spirit from its cage and drive a warrior to new heights of vigor and glory. Perhaps it can help you,. For if your voice fails now, Maznik, we will all be lost to the Beast."

Aearis found herself lifting a single flower to gaze into its center. It seemed endlessly deep and irresistibly attractive.

"Is it dangerous?" she heard herself ask. As if from a thousand miles away, she heard Raka's deep, rumbling chuckle.

"Yes."


	19. Frailty

"The doom lies in yourself, not in your name."

\- J. R. R. Tolkien, _The Children of Hurin_

On the fifth day after the attack, their luck changed. Moroko and Bereneth returned from their scouting mission with flushed cheeks and shining eyes. The Avar had been slashed across the chest by what appeared to be the claws of a great wild cat, and Bereneth's quiver had nearly run out. Gil-galad held up a hand when they made to speak, glancing around at the shadowy eves and beckoning them follow him down into the belly of the ship. Aearis trailed behind, checking her sister surreptitiously for injuries. When they had all-excepting Lagor, who remained bound and stricken in his cot-assembled in Gil-galad's quarters, Moroko spoke, more excitable than Aearis had ever seen him.

"Signs of our people to the southeast. If we follow Valka, we will find them."

"The river that your people call the Adorn," Raka said, noting the expressions of confusion on the faces of the Lindon elves. "We call her Valka. She is swift. Vicious. She has claimed the lives of many of our brethren."

"That river is too narrow and too violent for Suraranya, your majesty," Bereneth said. "We will have to drop anchor and continue on foot."

Aearis watched Gil-galad, his bright eyes shuttered as he contemplated the map Moroko drew with quick strokes of charcoal on vellum.

"Why would your people linger in these woods, knowing the threat that stalks them?" she asked when he remained silent. Raka's nostrils flared and her gaze hardened.

"The Kindi have guarded these lands for years uncounted before the Worm poisoned the forest, and we will remain until the last drop of our blood falls upon this soil."

"If any of your people remain alive, we will find them," Gil-galad said, raising his eyes to Raka's. "And if not, we will have vengeance."

The look in his eyes sent a shudder through Aearis's spine. Wrath and determination blazed there unchecked.

They struck out into the woods that morning, leaving Suraranya straining desperately against her mooring ropes. Struck by another wave of dread as she watched the struggling ship, Aearis pressed a kiss to the dark, glossy wooden hull before turning her back and delving into the looming shadows of the Forest of Isen. They welcomed her like an old friend.

Three days the company spent wading through the waist-deep, squelching forest floor, more marsh than land. The persistent whine and hum and buzz of circling insects filled Aearis's skull with thick, obfuscating noise that dulled her thoughts to a sluggish drone. But beneath the noise, the same terrifying silence stretched, an utter _absence _that drained her spirit greedily.

"There should be more than this," she found herself muttering under her breath as she trudged along. Where was the laughter of the trees when they reached out their roots to trip her? Where was the rebel spirit of the wilderness, the teeming fugue of voices that should fill the air with chattering music?

She followed the friendly twinkle of silver in Bereneth's hair with heavy, plodding steps as her sister hewed tirelessly through clinging brambles to clear a path. Glorfindel walked behind her, whistling simple tunes with seemingly inexhaustible good humor, so infectious that she even found herself humming along.

They walked without stopping, suspending sleep in the way that only elves could. Proper elves, anyway. Aearis could feel her strength flagging as they pressed on, the shamefully inadequate half-blood among the stoic elven warriors. On the second day, her knees buckled suddenly when she tried to clamber over a rotting log. She sprawled to the ground, shuddering as squealing vermin swarmed out of the hollowed wood. Glorfindel was beside her instantly, lifting her into his arms and away from the wriggling floor.

"Put me _down _," she snapped even as her body screamed its relief. "I can do this."

"Probably," he said agreebly, smiling down at her. "But I look so terribly heroic, carrying a fair and gentle maiden through the darkness."

"I am exactly none of those things," she retorted, struggling from his grasp and immediately regretting it as she sank into the mud up to her knees. She could not quite muster a complaint when he lifted her lute case from her back and draped it over his shoulder.

"We would be dead nine times over without your songs of protection, Aearis," he said softly as he fell into step beside her. "There is no shame in allowing yourself a moment of rest."

Her shoulders sagged as she struggled with the temptation to melt into the warmth of his arms. Ahead, Moroko came briefly into view through the glossy foliage. The bearlike Avar had Lagor draped limply over one massive shoulder, blindfolded and bound hand and foot, and her pride surged into her throat like bile at the idea of allowing herself to be borne so. So she forged ahead, jamming her hands into her pockets to stop their shaking. Absently, she ran one finger over the little cotton bundle in her right pocket.

_New heights of vigor and energy. _

The memory of the spicy, mouthwatering scent of the emerhari flowers haunted her as she waded through the mulch. The silver twinkle ahead of her filled her vision as she followed it thoughtlessly. Her mother had always walked so quickly, too quickly for Azruari's short, chubby legs to keep pace.

Gimlith stopped and glanced back impatiently.

"Come along, darling, or the food will grow cold on the table."

Azruari struggled to catch up, peering through the darkness. Her mother's face was stark under the starlight, pale beneath her tanned skin.

"I'm trying," she gasped, struggling for breath. The sand beneath her feet was sticky with something, viscous and oozing between her toes. "You're going too fast-I can't follow you."

"Too late," her mother said, shaking her head sadly. The night sky reflected off the dark sword that blossomed out of Gimlith's chest.

A pair of arms encircled Aearis before she could hit the forest floor.

"Sleep now," he murmured in her ear as he gathered her to her chest. "I have you."

Her eyes closed, and she slept.

When she awoke, it was to the gentle music of hushed voices mingling with the murmur of rushing water and the crackle of a fire.

She was warm, but not uncomfortably so, and golden, flickering light danced over her closed eyelids, gentle but insistent. The unmistakable, pungent presence of Dinalagos heated her back.

"I believe our Maznik has awakened," said a deep, hoarse female voice. A soft hand smoothed her brow.

"Slow now, little sister." Bereneth's quiet voice danced over her skin like autumn leaves, closer than her own heartbeat. She opened her eyes slowly, fighting the weight of the lids. Her sister's pale face swam into view, wide grey eyes brimming with affection. The firelight limned her auburn hair in red and gold and danced merrily off the silver ornaments. Everything behind Bereneth was as impenetrably dark as she was bright.

"Where?" she croaked, wincing at the rusted harshness of her own voice.

"We found the Kindi encampment about a day after you lost consciousness. We are in a cave at the base of the Ered Nimrais*. Safe, for now." Bereneth's fingers were tracing out soothing patterns along Aearis's temples and tangling in her hair. "How do you feel?" The last question was asked hesitantly, as if Bereneth feared the answer. Aearis considered carefully before answering.

"Stupid," she decided. Bereneth laughed hard, almost succeeding in covering the deep sob that broke from her mouth.

"Good," she replied, ceasing her gentle ministrations to flick Aearis's nose, hard. "You should feel very, _very _stupid."

"How long was I asleep?" Aearis asked, raising a heavy hand to rub absently at her nose.

"One and a half days," Raka supplied from behind Bereneth. "We thought the serpent had taken your mind."

"I think it tried," she said, noticing her splitting headache for the first time as she propped herself up on her elbows.

"Drink." Bereneth poured water down her throat before she could ask another question.

"Valier, woman," she sputtered when Bereneth allowed her a moment's breath, "you have the bedside manner of a warg."

"And you have the common sense of a hummingbird," Bereneth retorted. Aearis made no attempt to suppress her smile.

"And _you_," she said, reaching out to press her sister's shaking hand, "are very beautiful when you're angry." Though her glare did not subside, the tension around Bereneth's downturned lips relaxed slightly.

"You are impossible," she sighed, carding her hand fretfully through Aearis's hair.

"Ah, Singeareth, you have awakened." Gil-galad was announced only by a gleam in the shadows before he emerged into the small circle of light cast by their fire. Bereneth tensed visibly, eyes flashing with repressed anger. But Aearis's heart rate picked up immediately at sight of the starlit king, passion and purpose marked in every taut line of his body. "Are you able to stand?"

She was. She rose at his bidding despite Bereneth's protestations, finding her feet with gratifying ease.

"I await your command, my king," she said, and the rust dropped away from her voice when he favored her with that wide, brilliant smile.

"We believe that the dragon tried to reach out to your mind. To draw you to its lair, perhaps." There was an eager glint in his eye as he spoke, one that affected her more than the revelation that the beast hunted her, specifically. "It must know that your songs protect us from its influence."

"So it wanted to draw me away from the rest, then kill me?" she said, her voice more steady than she felt. "What an honor."

"Kill you?" Gil-galad repeated, as if the thought had not occurred to him. "Possible, but unlikely. This beast does not kill so indiscriminately as that. The Avari have lost many, but found few bodies. I cannot believe that our quarry would not be so foolish as to waste a valuable instrument." It occurred to Aearis that perhaps she ought to be offended, rather than flattered, to be described in such terms, but she could not find it in herself to object. "No, its intentions for you must be more complex than mere death."

"Oh," she said blankly. "What a relief."

"Your majesty," Bereneth began, a note of what sounded like warning in her voice, "we have already discussed-"

"So I should go where it wants to take me, then."

The utter silence that followed her statement allowed her voice to echo through the cavern. Gil-galad stared at her, perfectly still, and she held his gaze calmly while her heart battered itself against her ribs as though desperately seeking an escape route.

A smile started on the king's lips, spreading until his glinting white teeth seemed to fill her vision.

"I knew you would see it as I do, my lady." His voice positively trembled with exhilaration. Behind Aearis, Bereneth lowered her face into her hands and began to cry softly.

It was decided that she would set out, alone, at dawn the next day. Decided, that is, by Gil-galad and herself, while the others remained firmly and unanimously opposed. Aearis reflected from her strangely removed state of mind that she had never seen Glorfindel quite so angry as he had been when he returned from scouting with the Kindi to find Aearis planning her own abduction.

He had slammed his fist on the makeshift stone table so hard that a long crack had opened in the surface. He might very well have repeated the maneuver with Gil-galad himself, had Aearis not placed herself between them and captured his liberally bleeding hand in hers.

"We had an _agreement, _Ereinion," Glorfindel snarled over her head.

"It was not my suggestion," Gil-galad replied, apparently unphased by the murder in his general's eyes. "Lady Aearis came to the same conclusion as I did, independently."

"Aearis," Bereneth supplied in a shaking voice, "is an idiot." Gil-galad raised a brow at the pale, drawn woman, but allowed the implied insult to himself to slip by unaddressed.

"And you _planted _the idea-"

"This is a ridiculous argument," Aearis interrupted. "Whatever you think of this plan, it is the only one I have yet heard that may bring us into striking range of the dragon. Or did you intend to spend the next yen wandering the forest, hoping it gets careless?"

"We will find it eventually," Glorfindel retorted resolutely, turning the full force of his glare on her.

"And how many Kindi will die or disappear before that happens? This is quick. This will _work. _Don't be a sentimental fool."

"We do not know this would work, and even if we did, I still would not allow you-"

"_ This is not your decision, _" she hissed. "You cannot stop me unless you plan to disobey your king and chain me to the floor."

"Neither is out of the question," he retorted. There was something in his expression that made her drop his hand and take a half step backwards. Her sudden, irrational fear of him must have shown, because all the anger dropped instantly from his face. He faltered and ran a hand over his eyes. When he spoke again, his voice was hoarse and pleading. "Aearis, you must reconsider. We will find another way, if you just give me a little time…" he trailed off, discouraged. She sighed and took up his hand again, running her fingers over the lines on his palm.

"I cannot wait while it erodes my sanity night by night, Glorfindel. I do not intend to die, but I would rather be killed quickly than suffer as Lagor does. This is what I am doing, of my own free will. I've a much better chance of succeeding if you stand by me."

She was manipulating him, and they both knew it, opening just enough to display her weakness, her need. Just enough to draw him in before she snapped shut and trapped him in her wake. His eyes flickered between hers, and she could almost hear his mind churning as he sought another argument, another desperate bid to change her mind. Eventually, he slumped a little and his shining eyes dimmed.

"Of course I will stand by you," he whispered, lowering his head to rest his brow against hers. Tendrils of soft, bright hair fell forward to caress her face like sunlight. "Always."

The system of caves and tunnels that wove through the base of the Misty Mountains were crushingly dark and filled with the echoes of dripping water. Driven from their forest dwellings by the shadow of the beast, the Kindi had made a valiant effort to make a home of the endless labyrinth of murmuring caves. But the bright lanterns could not much lift the mantle of chilly shadows, and the colorful woven textiles hung on the walls did little to muffle the stony echoes issuing from the deeps.

She found Lagor after much wandering in the deep warrens of the Kindi. He was laid out neatly and surrounded by muttering Avari. The three women who clustered around his bedroll were nearly translucent with age, more spirit than substance. They spoke continuously and usually simultaneously, but their voices were little more than whispers ricocheting from wall to wall in the echoing cavern.

"He will die soon." Raka's voice behind her. Her sudden appearances had become quite routine, but Aearis started nevertheless, waking from her horrified contemplation of Lagor's gray, hollow face. "It will be a mercy when he does."

The last time she had seen him, the young warrior had been tossing, turning, flailing, his face screwed up in pain, tangled hair sticking to the sweat dripping from his temples. Now he was still, eyes wide and blank. His hair had been brushed and braided back to clear his fine, motionless face, and his skin was dull and pale as chalk. Aearis had not thought anything could be worse than the contortions of agony that had wracked him day and night since the Suraranya was attacked. How terribly wrong she had been.

She dropped to her knees beside one of the Kindi elders, brushing the woman's skin as she did so. It was nothing more than a sigh of chilly wind against her arm, and she suppressed the urge to shudder and pull away only with difficulty. The elder seemed to sense her discomfort, because she turned her bottomless, opalescent stare on Aearis, and smiled.

"Kar fien ketya, Maznik."

"Do your worst, soft one" Raka translated.

Aearis bristled at the palpable amusement of the Avari women as they watched her. With her hand resting over Lagor's eyes, she began her song, pouring power forth incautiously in her annoyance. His spirit twisted away from it, shuttering against her the instant her fëa touched his. She pressed and he retreated, just out of her reach. She pushed a little harder and felt his resistance give way slightly. The cost of the song burned in her chest until she could hardly breathe around it, but she persisted until a calloused hand pressed hard over her mouth.

"Enough," Raka said in her ear, pulling her away from the bedroll forcefully. There was the hint of a snarl in her throat. "You cannot stop a man from bleeding out by slitting your own veins." Aearis twisted out of the huntress's hold as it went slack.

"I can reach him. I _know _I can. I just need a little more-"

"You chase a phantom, Maznik," she sighed. "The beast baits you to exhaust your power fighting a battle that is already lost."

The truth that rang in her words filled Aearis with furious desperation.

"If his strength is waning, we could… we could give him some emerhari!" she said impulsively, her hand straying to her pocket. The whispers that filled the cave halted abruptly as the heads of all three elders snapped around, and Raka flinched and turned pale under the bronze of her skin.

"Mothersblood does not give strength where none remains," the huntress explained, though her eyes were fixed warily on the three glaring women, "only ignites what is already there. It is a debt that must always be paid later. Your friend is spent. Even the petal-tea would kill him. Go now, Maznik. Rest. The morning will not be kind."

Aearis might have stayed to argue, but the air was jagged with tension, and she strongly suspected that her presence would only provoke the elders further. She stepped out of the cave into the humid evening as the last light slipped away into the West.

That night she made no attempt to sleep. The mouth of their small cavern was concealed behind a roaring waterfall that sheltered them from the jungle beyond with its cool, silver mantle. Filthy as she was from the mud and decay of the forest paths, Aearis seized the first free moment to slip out and clamber up the steep mountain face until she reached a ledge wide enough to accommodate her. The trees were sparser and smaller near the White Mountains, and moonlight filtered through them to cast pale rainbows through the cascading droplets of water.

Aearis vibrated with delight, a little light-headed in the rare air on her ledge, shivering as the icy mountain spring water fell over her skin. Here, dozens of meters of the ground, looking out over the treetops through the shimmer of the falls, she felt flush with power.

She scrubbed aggressively with a scrap of rough cotton until her skin was raw and red and new, stripped forcibly of the exhaustion, the confusion, the unbearable weakness of the last several days. Then she lingered under the biting spray, exposed to the night sky as she dressed slowly. The stiff linen of her shirt scraped abrasively, leaving her painfully aware of the fragility of her own skin.

Aearis found herself strangely unsurprised when Gil-galad hoisted himself up onto the ledge beside her. She found herself unable to muster any concern for her modesty as his eyes followed the dancing patterns of light that the falls cast over her exposed throat. She kept her own gaze firmly on the moonlit canopy laid out before them, but she was almost painfully alert, acutely aware of his every motion in her peripheral vision. Tension coiled pleasantly in her abdomen, sharp and sweet.

"Have you come to distract me in my final hours, your majesty?" she asked. He favored her with a sardonic smile, but allowed the silence to stretch unbroken until it was nearly unbearable.

"I thought you might like your flute back," he said at length, drawing the long line of silver from his pocket. Her fingers itched at the sight of it-for three years she had found herself reaching into her pockets for it before remembering that it remained in his possession. But he made no motion to return it, twirling it around his fingers absently.

"You play it better than I do," she admitted reluctantly. Every time the little flute passed over his middle finger, the moonlight flashed over its surface with blinding intensity.

"There is sadness cast into its very form," he mused after another long pause. "Playing upon it-"

"-tastes like mortality," she finished, interrupting him before she remembered what he was. He raised a brow at her in that particular expression of his, which he reserved for when she had done something shocking and just barely gotten away with it.

"Is that what it is?" He sounded curious, almost childlike. "How unsettling, then, that I enjoy it so much." His eyes burned on her skin like an indelible brand. It was a relief when he returned his attention to the flute as it flashed and glimmered in his long fingers like a dagger. "Very well, then. If I cannot bring myself to relinquish this trinket of yours, Singeareth, then I must offer you some token in return." He turned and evaluated her with a long, thorough glance that she felt all the way to her toes. "Perhaps an answer to one of those insolent questions that are always burning at the very tip of your tongue?"

"Surely a taste of the Gift of Men is worth at least three answers," she said. As usual, her common sense arrived, gasping for breath, just a split second after the words were spoken. She clapped a hand to her mouth as she heard herself, bargaining with the High King of the Noldor as if he were a common wine merchant in Swallow's Rest. The flute had stilled in his hand and he eyed her, perfectly unreadable. That breath of silence was interminable. Then he laughed, clear and sweet, almost careless.

"Two," he returned. "But I shall do my best to be extraordinarily entertaining."

"A noble endeavor." He grinned. She should have paused, chosen with careful deliberation, but the first question sprang to her lips instantly. "Why the obsession with dragons?"

He cocked his head and pursed his lips as he considered his answer, then leaned onto his elbows to look up into the endless sky. His gaze was disconcertingly unfocused; the same glassy distance that stole over Glorfindel's face sometimes when he thought himself unobserved.

"I suppose you have read some accounts of the kingdom of Nargothrond," he said. His voice was dreamy, almost drunken, completely estranged from its usual cadence of martial precision, and perfectly enchanting in its softness.

"The kingdom of Finrod Felagund, most faithful friend of the edain." Her own voice hushed to match his. She had little memory for matters of succession, but the name of the gentle philosopher king remained revered among the Elendili. He chuckled under his breath and cast her a rueful, sidelong look.

"Friend of the edain," he repeated. "You betray yourself, to reveal your loyalties so readily, Aearis Half-Elven." He raised the flute to the light again and kept his eyes upon it as he continued. "Yes, Finrod began it. But when he left, drawn by the call of your mortal forefather, my father took up the crown. For thirty years King Orodreth defended the realm from horrors untold. The onslaughts were endless. Brutal. Intended only to destroy what was beautiful and innocent. And destroy they did, in the end. All that was pure and good, fell. All that was sweet turned to bitterness." His tone became clipped, so dispassionate that it contrasted eerily with the sorrow of the tale. "And when the Father of Dragons came to the door, _my _father, my king, fell before him. They tell me it was not quick."

Aearis's mind had slowed to a crawl, and it was only sluggishly that the realization dawned on her.

"Then…" she said, "Your sister was Finduilas, who loved Turin Turambar." An image of Bereneth, pale and dead and pinned to a willow tree by a spear through her breast, swam before her eyes and she shut them tightly as her stomach rolled. She could sense his eyes on her again, and when he spoke again he sounded grimly amused.

"Have you really spent several years in my court without learning my ancestry?" He was deflecting, but she had not the heart to press him. "Were you anyone else, I would think you a liar." He seemed vaguely pleased, as though her ignorance indicated purity of heart rather than the stubborn aversion to studying history that had frustrated an endless series of tutors.

"I have a very unimpressive memory. Why do you think I never sing the same song twice?" He laughed just a shade too long at that. Aearis opened her eyes slowly and let the clear night sky wash the unwelcome vision away.

"I supposed that you sensed my yearning for novelty and sought to indulge me." He paused to study her again, gazing through his thick, dark lashes with flesh-peeling intensity. "I was there, you know," he said conversationally. "I had come with two messengers from Sirion to beg my father to cast down the Bridge of Nargothrond, to retreat to safety as Turgon did in Gondolin. But I was only a child, and my father took no counsel that did not come from Mormegil." When Gil-galad spoke the epesse of the mortal Man, his tone of flat recitation was disrupted, ever so briefly, by a ripple of cold, ancient rage-a rage that slid between her ribs to nick her heart with its poison edge.

"In Numenor," she ventured, sounding braver than she felt, "it is told that Turin alone stood against Glaurung." He bared his teeth in a terrible, mirthless grin.

"Finrod Felagund abandoned his post to chase the fancy of a mortal Man. He died fulfilling his foolish pledge to the edain. But when Glaurung came to call, Turin Mormegil, Captain of Nargothrond, architect of its destruction, failed before him. He stood by, dumb as stone, as my father's realm crumbled and my sweet sister was led away to slaughter."

The king's mouth shut abruptly and a muscle jumped in his jaw. She waited, spellbound and terrified, breath suspended until her lungs burned, for him to continue.

"I can forgive many things, Aearis." He turned to her with a smile, but his eyes were hard as adamant. "Almost any sin, really. But I will not, I _cannot _forgive that weakness of spirit that bends in the face of evil. For it was one Man's pride and frailty that broke the back of Nargothrond."

Aearis waited again, but he seemed satisfied to sit in silence, reflective eyes fixed upon the starry sky.

"So that's it?" A flare of annoyance ignited deep in her chest. "You race about hunting dragons, risking your own life and those of your warriors, to prove your superiority over a long-dead Man?"

His head jerked around and he stared at her as a swift sequence of expressions flitted over his face. She held her breath, waiting for the inevitable-and thoroughly deserved-anger. But he settled instead into an expression she had never seen before. A gentle smile, almost rueful.

"I suppose that is one-_ very _uncharitable-interpretation," he said slowly, his eyes not leaving her face. He sighed and sat up, turning to face her and crossing his long legs in front of him. "Perhaps indeed there is _some _truth in it. But there is more. When we fight dragons, we wage war against the weakness in ourselves. To face a dragon, to look into its eyes and remain resolute… it is the highest standard of strength." Her expression must have been more eloquent than she intended, because he laughed, with true mirth this time. It was a sound too beautiful to be altogether pleasant, for it nestled deep beneath the flesh and made its home there, ringing in the ear long after it had ended. "You still think it frivolous. The vanity of an old man, perhaps."

"I said nothing, your majesty," she replied, imitating Rhossorieth's bland, courtly smile. That laugh again, exquisite and exquisitely painful.

"Your disapproval is duly noted, Aearis. And if I were any other, you might be right. But I am not free as others are, to err, to stray, to fall to a pair of tempting eyes." Here he paused, and Aearis found herself forced to look away from his strange, direct gaze. "I am not a man. I am King, and my purpose is to protect. And the day my will fails must be the day I die. For if I cannot stare into the heart of corruption unswayed, then I can no longer serve my purpose." When he finished speaking, the silence that fell around them had a music all its own, delicate, unguarded, and compelling.

"That sounds lonely," she mused, mostly to herself. He did not answer, but resumed twirling the little flute around his fingers, bright and distracting in her peripheral vision. In the heavy, stalled air, the terrible silence of the forest returned to niggle at the edges of her mind, summoning with it an onslaught of unwelcome thoughts. Of dark hair fanned out over red-soaked grass, of mist billowing around a shadowy form, of violet robes torn and crusted with river mud, of glassy eyes turned skyward. Her second question came more haltingly, stumbling with reluctance.

"When our party was attacked on the way to Lindon, there was a sort of…" she felt silly, childish even, as she sought a description for the terrible, empty creature that had attacked them, "a… Shadow, of sorts-"

"Ah." She glanced in his direction, paused on the arch twist of his mouth, the hard, knowing gleam in his eyes. "So Glorfindel has told you nothing. How very like him." She felt an obligation to defend her champion from the king's derision, but something in his tone made her confidence waver.

"He said that the Enemy has many servants, that we could not know for certain what it was that attacked us," she faltered. Gil-galad's smile could have cut bone.

"He always was a surprisingly good liar." Aearis opened her mouth to disagree, but her voice died and her stomach contorted into knots. "The trick is telling only the truth. No, of course we cannot _know _, for uncertainty is the Enemy's greatest weapon. But we are not so ignorant as your dear protector would have you believe." He paused, seemingly for effect. In other circumstances she might have laughed at the melodrama of it, but every muscle in her body was tense. "You are a clever girl, Aearis-I imagine you have guessed some of it. That was no mere evil spirit that assailed your company. It was a Man." He examined her face and appeared pleased by what he found there. "That does not altogether surprise you, I see."

"One of the wraith-kings," Aearis murmured, flexing her fingers, which had grown suddenly terribly cold.

"Not only one of them," Gil-galad corrected her, with no gentility in his voice. "Sauron's greatest and most terrible servant. A lord from the West, son of Numenor, tyrant of Belfalas. More than four yen it has been since our people helped the Elendili oust him from his seat at the mouth of Anduin, and now he surfaces again, remade in the image of his master."

If he continued speaking, Aearis did not hear him. She was deafened by the sound of her own blood rushing, transfixed by the blue of the veins pulsing in her wrists, paralyzed as she fought an overwhelming urge to claw the corruption out of her own flesh.

"I suppose that you have been more attentive to my bloodline than I to yours," she murmured when she could trust her voice not to waver. Gil-galad had the grace at least to feign regret.

"Many branches now separate your line from his, my lady," he said.

"Not enough," she bit out. "His blood will forever taint mine. I should have known that his would be the hand that defeated my mother. That will someday defeat me." The last sentence tore past her lips in a choked whisper, and Aearis felt, distinctly and with horror, a cold finger tracing along her spine. "Then that is why you have brought me here," she continued. "To undergo the trial of Mormegil. To test the frailty of my blood for yourself, yes?"

"Another wholly cynical interpretation," Gil-galad chided. "What _must _you think of me?"

"You do not deny it," she pointed out.

"Nor do I affirm, for you have your two answers and I will not be swindled for a third without further compensation." His gently teasing tone was so light, so incongruously merry, that she nearly forgot the dense pit in her stomach.

"I remain unsatisfied," she informed him flatly. He leaned in and smiled, and it was boyish and conspiratorial.

"Ah," he said. "But you _were _entertained."

He left her shivering, bracing against the long, cold night.

* * *

The gray hours before dawn found Bereneth pacing, filled to the brim with useless energy. She had fletched arrows until her fingers bled, sharpened her sword until it begged her for mercy, then strayed out to the forest edge to press her heart to the trunks of the looming trees. But the air throbbed with that deep, serrated silence. The silence that consumed, that smothered. The absence.

"Why will you not speak to me?" She blushed at the petulance in her own voice. Certainly, she was not, as Aearis said, the "woodiest" of wood elves. She had adapted too well, perhaps, to halls of marble and walkways of cobblestone, had forgotten some of the older lullabies of Greenwood. But never had she met a forest that so wholly and sullenly neglected her, and the absence rankled like the ghostly ache of a severed limb.

"Do not take it to your heart," said Raka at her shoulder. "The silence fell in the forest years ago, so softly that at first even we could not hear it."

"How can the will of a single creature silence so many voices?" Bereneth stared into the shadows beyond the trees, but the darkness was solid, impenetrable. Rake sighed, a heavy sound that did not suit the light-footed Avarin woman and her flashing eyes.

"I forget sometimes that you are young. You do not yet know what it is to be tired. The trees that stand guard by Valka are old. Older than sun's rise and moon's fall. Is it any wonder that they would welcome a rest?"

She spoke in a tone that Bereneth had heard before, not many years ago. A creaking, gusty tone, as if the speaker was tattered, full of holes, worn beyond physical measure. She looked at Raka with new eyes, found the flicker around her edges, the translucent pallor of her eyes, the slightest bow of her shoulders where her kindness had pressed down hard upon her back. Raka was not as ancient as Cestedir, nor as battle-torn as Glorfindel, but she was worn, frayed around the edges, made hard and brittle by the difficulty of her life.

"Aearis will not succumb to slumber." She said it with certainty, and found to her surprise that she believed it. Raka laughed.

"No, she will burn the forest to the ground before she agrees to another-ai, how do you say it in this young language of yours?-"

"I believe the word you are looking for is 'nap.'" Aearis seemed to materialize from nothing as the first ray of sunlight breached the horizon, melting away the shadows that clung to her.

"Ah, yes. Our little witch needs no _naps. _" Raka's thick, throaty burr rumbled with affectionate amusement. Aearis smiled and batted playfully at the Avarin woman's hand as it ruffled her hair, but her eyes were distant and shuttered. Bereneth moved to her side instinctively, catching up her gloved hands to feel for that tell-tale tremor. But her slim fingers were steady, and they intertwined tightly with Bereneth's.

"Are you ready?" Bereneth murmured in a low voice. Then, unable to fully restrain herself: "It is not too late to alter the plan, if you are unsure-"

"Yes, it is." There was an edge of iron in Aearis's voice. "I am sure and ready as I have ever been."

"Excellent!" The king approached, flanked closely by Gildor. Their shining shields and armor had been blackened with pitch, but their weapons gleamed proudly at their hips and backs. Gil-galad's eyes burned feverish with excitement, Gildor's darted fretfully towards the forest, then back to the diminutive girl.

"Raka and I will walk with you, as if we are scouting together. Remember," Gildor said, quick and hushed, "the beast cannot know that you follow under your own will, nor that you are tracked by your friends. It must appear to be a true surrender-"

"Yes, I believe that Lady Aearis is well acquainted with the scheme," Gil-galad interjected wryly. He grinned at Aearis, who withstood his blazing stare with nary a waver.

"I will not fail, majesty." Her voice had a note of finality that frightened Bereneth, though she scarcely knew why. Only when Aearis winced softly did Bereneth realize that she had been tightening her grip steadily, crushing the bard's hands in her own.

Glorfindel was, as usual, the last to arrive. He looked pale and strained under his glowing skin and forcibly calm demeanor, and a muscle jumped in his clenched jaw. His greeting was terse, the barest minimum of courtesy and a perilously shallow bow to the king. Aearis released Bereneth's hands with a final, reassuring smile and moved swiftly to draw Glorfindel just out of hearing range. They stood silhouetted by the rising sun, heads close together.

"What is taking them so long?" snapped Gildor after a time. He was, in every respect, the perfect specimen of Noldorin beauty: tall, broad-shouldered, gray gaze keen as sword's point and ancient beyond understanding. The effect was spoiled only by his hair, which he kept scandalously short, and by the pungent pipe that dangled constantly between his thin lips. He took a long drag of it now and released a long stream of perfectly concentric rings.

"You said it yourself, old friend," the king said, his tone placating. "The illusion of surrender must be complete. She must fracture her mind, lock away a single shard of her spirit to remain untouched by the dragon's influence. That takes time, even for our Singeareth."

"Sounds like bloody witchcraft to me," Gildor muttered.

"How astute of you to notice," the king replied, straight-faced. Gildor did not appear soothed.

"You cannot possibly approve of this," he said to Bereneth. "Rhossorieth would have me locked in the dungeons if I tried anything half so reckless." Acutely aware of the king's eyes fixed on her face, she schooled her expression into an expression that she hoped was one of steady confidence.

"If all goes well, she will be restored when the dragon dies. If not, Glorfindel holds the key to wake her. A phrase that will call forth the untouched fragment of her spirit." He shook his head in disbelief.

"One cannot simply _shake off _a dragon's influence," he insisted. "She could not even release Lagor, how can we be certain-"

"Enough." Gil-galad's voice was soft and dangerous, ending the discussion abruptly as Aearis and Glorfindel rejoined the group.

"It is done," Glorfindel said. His face was carefully blank. Aearis smiled at them all, bright-eyed and eerily cheerful. Raka eyed her with a slightly cocked head, wary and curious as a yearling wolf.

"Are you ready for your first scouting mission, Maznik?" she hazarded. Aearis turned to her, radiantly untroubled.

"I have been ready for _weeks _," she chirruped, but her eyes were already far away, fixed upon the forest.

Dinalagos pressed close to Bereneth's shoulder, and she tangled one hand deep in the great hound's fur as she watched the last ripple of Gimlith's old cloak vanish into the shadows of the silent trees.

Her breath came short and sharp, each inhale piercing her chest as an arrowhead. Raka's signal had come just as the midday sun reached its hottest blaze, boiling the humid air around them, and Bereneth had plunged into the shrieking forest, heedless of Gil-galad's instruction. Glorfindel followed close behind, with Gildor, Moroko, and the king at his heels.

Aearis was not difficult quarry to track. Her feet were light, but she left a strange crackling wake behind her, as if a minute thunderstorm had stirred the air and left it electrified behind her. Bereneth leapt from branch to breaking branch, guided only by instincts she had believed long-rusted by her years among the stony Noldor.

She heard her before she saw her. That voice, so excruciatingly loved, trickling through the dense canopy like the first droplets of a heavy rain. Aearis was singing low, a sweet song with words that Bereneth could not quite make out. It had the cadence of a harmony, a half of a duet, but Bereneth could not hear the other part. They were close now. The half-song grew more distinct, and with it, the deafening silence that marked the dragon's presence.

The sight of Aearis as she came into view nearly stopped Bereneth's heart. The bard stood alone at the heart of a fetid clearing, where the odor of stagnant water hung in the air. She was hip-deep in mud, holding her lute gingerly out of the filth as she plucked out a simple melody. Crouched in the crook of a great, gnarled beech tree, bearded with gray moss, Bereneth watched Aearis, irresistibly soft, bright, and vulnerable, spin her invitation. At the very corner of her mind, she felt the boughs of the surrounding trees creak, canting towards the singer as if to listen. Then, quite suddenly, the forest changed.

The foliage beyond the clearing shivered, melted, and reformed into a great, sinuous form thicker than the oldest tree and so long that it encircled the clearing several times over. Slowly, almost lazily, the great beast raised its head and settled its gaze upon the lone woman who stood, chin raised defiantly, within its coils. Bereneth had an arrow knocked and trained upon the beast before coherent thought could form. Then, from the corner of her eye she saw Aearis, eyes still fixed upon the serpent, shake her head minutely, almost imperceptibly. The intention rang clear as sunlight through her mind. _Wait. _

The beast's head swayed mesmerically. It was, undeniably, a beautiful thing. The millions of small, delicate scales were subtly lustrous, but they seemed to have no true color of their own. They perfectly reflected the green of the canopy, the flashes of bright oranges and violets of the clinging orchids, and the occasional glimpse of blue sky peeking through the dense boughs overhead. The monster's face was that of a flat-nosed viper with barbed scales that flared out around its jaw like a crest of iridescent feathers. Its wide, fanged mouth was curled into a permanent smile. Its eyes were so large that Aearis could have sat comfortably in one of the sockets, and they glimmered with the fire of the finest Noldorin gems.

For a moment, girl and beast remained locked in mutual fascination, shimmering with barely-contained power. Then the first arrow flew, and chaos reigned.


End file.
